

>:>-:> 


» 


);>^^ 




»») 




>)?» 




>>» 


> 


» ' > 


>•>> 


1 )> 


■■>^ 


'TO ^ 


^ 


)?>> 


y 


))!>> 


~>j-^ 


o 


>:> 


> 


>>^ 


> 


>^ 


^> 


> ) > 


^ ■ 


.>> 


>^ 


2>j 


'->> 


> ") 


>> 


^ > 


>> 



:> > > ^ '- u 

>:> >> > 

^> >>^^: 

>-> >) >'-> 

>> ):> ^ 

J > ) ^ ) > 

>> >> ^ '. 

>'' «•■>■ 

> ^ > > > > 

> - > > > > « 

>■• yy y ) 
. :> > > > 
^> > > 
> > > 
> > 

> > > > 
>> :> > 

> > :> ^ 

' > > 

>> ^ >: 

>:> > > 



^LIBRARY OF CONGRESS. 

I =^/.^ L.a..4iW3| 



I UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. | 



> > 



>?>^1^ 



3^ * > 









►» 



:> >> 



H 




MAN. 




—A— 




aettiinIS ^mtta§. 



'^ Ah ovo usque ad mala." 



BY FRANZ S. G^ANTER. 



^ 



AUTHORS JEDITIOJSr. 



NEW ORLEANS: 

PRINTED BV THRNEW ORLEANS COMMERCIAL BULLETIN PRINTINGCO., 133 GRAVIERST. 

1871. 



) 



5^ 



-es- 




PR-ICE, 0]VE jyOT^T^AJEl. 



MAN. 




om( in iS ^mito^. 



^^ Ah ovo usque ad maUi.^^ 



— ^ 



BY FRANZ S. aANTER. 



Eiiterfd according to act of Congress, in the year 1871, by F. S. Ganter, in 
the office of the Libiarian of Congress, at Washington. 



\ 




NEW ORLEANS: 

PKINTKU BY THKXEW ORLEANS COMMERCIAL BULLETIN PRINTING CO., ISIUiRAVIERST. 

1871. 

II- 






THIS WORK 

Is respeetluUy dtclicated to WALTER H. ROGERS, Esq., of New 
OikanH, as a, testiiuonial of tlie grateful leraemljrance, iu wliichhis 
kindness will ever he held by 

THE AUTHOR. 



B^For Etf^U sfcti Piige 176. 



ML J 



CANTO T 



CONTENTS. 

Muu's Uiigin, the Eaitli and the Uai^rerse— iSecue where the Poem 
beoina— The Parents of Tristian, its Hero— His Family and 
Infancy— The Fallof Manj and liis Condition under it—Depart- 
Lire for America. 

Evolved from His lite frauglifc Intiiiity 

God-ushered Man aliglits into this earth, 

The nursery of his eterual home ; 

And studyin.i^' here, ia his uncertain term, 

Aware or heedless of his furthering in ; 

L^rged by a goad^ or hy a goal alhired 

As life is naught to him wlio has no gust — 

Wliat Man may cast, be it i/i hope or fear 

To harvest ere, or after his depart, 

lie tills the realms of heaven or of hell. 

These two antagonistic names, else fixed 

Indicative, in both extremes, of all 

h\ stuff gr spirit kuown, now designate, 

In unison, the place our talc begins. 

Were not its sponsors parted long ago, 

To that eternal where, whose counterparts 

They feigned to name on earth, v/e'd make the quest 

Whence own these conternames their origin ? 

Since but the appellation blest by Man 

Is there by JS'ature to his senses owned ; 

For, as the Sun smiles on her heavenly calm. 

So more sublime the storm concerts her murk ; 

Xor were these names entailed by deities, 

Who long liave vanished in the Ages' tomb, 

I^)r there not Fable reared their dread abodes. 

Vet though the Powers in the legend lack, 

lU'hold in sooth their deputies on earth, 

Whose best credentials are their own avouch, 

Since thence a great part of the Majesty 

Which long has daunted Man, and daunts him stili 

Sprang from those eyry-cr<igs — one South, one East, 



2 MAJV. 

Whose piunacles sUll pierce tlie moiintaiu mist, 
Mark too, liow nigh the hitter looms a third, 
Its kindred, since Irom it tliat Scion spranj^- 
Who, when selected as a plautini>' slip 
For Spanish ground, Avas snatched np as the br;iiid. 
Whose lighted fire consumed the Starter's own, 
And fused an empire for his goaded foe. 
This for our tale of Man's attendant lore : 
Profane or holy, this is God's earth all, 
And sacred there to Man where he is born. 
'Twas in anight wlien vSpring, Earth's waitiiag -maid, 
Through with her decking of the forward vales, 
Dispensed her perfume as she clomb those Heiglits. 
Who in return for her volux^tuous scent . 
On her their bracing pine-aroma blew, 
Whereon her russet cheeks yet deeper gh)\\ ed. 
in other climes the shaded air were brisk 
Which here is tepid felt, and therefore Night 
If she would hear her feathered minstrel sing- 
Can list but in the vales, since on these Heiglits 
Where so sublimely looms her glorious brow 
Her praises are unsung: tlie more Niglit joys 
In yonder orb, whose Iiuman mien reveals 
That w^ere not Man. there were no Spheres above. 
As she through listless clouds tlie Orient scaled 
Xow them illuming, now by them obscured. 
The sombre forest of majestic i)incs 
Had on the landscape set its solemn hood ; 
Calm lay the air as were all motion stayed 
And Solitude, sole gnardian of this glebe. 
7\t noontide bowered in its gloom i(^st gh^i 
Had spread herself throughout her black dom;»in : 
'Twas as all nature by Remembrance struck * 
Of how she rose, lay in devotion's trance 
And the creative Spirit moved agyin. 
In such an hour, her inspiration feels 
The hero's soul: then states and systems fall. 
Yearned for by thousands, ]>reseiit now^ was none 
From this celestial moment's fleeting wing 
To pluck the pinion of eternity 
Save yonder two, and can these know its worth ! 
But only One, not they themselves could tell 
Who knew not what, but only that they I'elt 
As in that hour of ecstasy for them 
Prolitic Time more joys than seconds teeiiied, 
For they themselves were of the Eden fall 
Which is by Heav'n but once vouchsafed to Man 
Albeit its shadowed semblance may again. 
These two, returning from a marriage feast 
Broke not this spell, but gliding smoothly in 



MAN. 3 

Dissolved therewith like dewdrops iu the brook : 

Haud clasped, lost to th era selves, to all save Heav'ji 

They seemed as borne upoji the airy web 

The' Moon on vapor's loom wove with her beams. 

And like a lace iu heaven knit, their path 

Stretched 'tween the breathing-, glistening valh^v mead 

And gloomy forest slope; now and again 

Dewihlered in their beatilic maze, 

They slacked their dreamy on, and pausing gazed 

The one transligured in tlie other's soul. 

llUiminedby that heaven, there she stood 

A maid, yet in that prime of womanhood 

When Hummer curt'sies to retiring Spring. 

Her form as compact as the trunk of oak 

And limbs as glossy smooth as Sycamore's, 

Her breast, as lusty as the mountain doe's 

The freshness breathed of that valley mead. 

Her mind, as rugged as yond pine-topped crags 

Was to emotion tender as the dove's ; 

Of soul transparent as the forest brook, 

Wherein the moon-beams then her image glassed. 

She stood the abstract of her native land. 

And there more delicate the counter Man 

Scarce turned that youth from which tJie sculptors dra w 

Their angels' models w hen the3' sex theni male : 

She owned the body's, he the spirit's strength; 

Both were fit mates, else they had never met ; 

By chance their names, which of another Man 

The mother and the foster-father bore. 

Still on are they impelled, till they emerge 

Into the sheen lit glade, where grandly loomed 

A solitarj' pine, whose hoary limbs 

Yet swung their reverent canopy as dense 

As when they shrined the Druid heathen-rites : 

Its blast-firm crown of knotted mistletoe 

Securely fenced a hallowed cross-bill's nest. 

That bird, vernacular Tradition tells 

By heaven inspired, when Man abandoned him 

Flocked upon Calvary, to succor him : 

They gnawed and tugged, but could not draw the spikes 

Yet not desisted till their bills were crooked, 

And hence their name. The two proceeded on, 

Until their gait, no longer now their own 

Brought them beneaththat pine-tree's broad expanse 

And there they rested. All below, above. 

The earth, the heavens and eternity, 

That moment, was their own. In that dread spell 

If thou, Oh Man ! wilt but bethink it full, 

AYas consummated, unwitting to themselves, 

A miracle-mistery as wonderful 



4 MAisr. 

As the creation of the universe, 

For the same Power then was operant 

And yet a little time, when -cross the glade 

A raveo, by an owl i^ursued, shot out 

The forest's slope and beat into the copse ; 

Snapped were tlie cords that had held nature bound 

And now the hour, when mortal Man can spy 

Into her workshop, had forever lapsed. 

That it had lasted! Then could have been learned 

Whence the immortal embryo soul comes forth, 

What cast, if aught, she from the father's soul — 

What from the mother's and her humors takes ; 

How, by her mind's and body's fitful gusts, 

During gestation of so many moons. 

She's characterized. — Now to know is lost. 

The straggling moon succumbing to the clouds. 

The earth too yielded to their allied mist ; 

The two, already of the change aware, 

Felt nature's alteration in their own ; 

And, guided by their souFs new risen light, 

Instead the forest path, the highway sought 

And homeward strove, knowing themselves a part 

Of what they had been ignorant before. 

The mother bore her other growing self, 

More weighing on her heart than on her womb, 

Ijntil the hour, that first one's counterpart, 

When from the tree of life, in fated throes, 

The ripened fruit was plucked. Its income cry 

Struck on no envious car, for on this earth, 

The space it had to fill, was vrelcome void— 

The next day's sun shone on it at the font, 

Whence it, to us, the name of Tristian owns. 

Its little life increased, and spring-like bloomed. 

As though kind nature, for its growth, distilled 

Her very essences, as it was borne, 

In suuimer, by its mother to the fields; 

xVnd which she labored, cradled in their green 

Beneath the rose' and hazel's canopy- ; 

Whilst, far above, in his momentum swung 

The circling eagle from his Alpine home. 

And from her blue, the lark, as heaven near, 

Unseen, like Conscience, beat her quavering thrill 

Into tlie soul of Man, and clam'rous vied 

All creatures, in their several ways for joy, 

To own existence in this universe ! 

Then with ecstatic nature crowed the babe, 

As it were conscious of the kindred trait 

When, woe the hour! pert Science, overquick 

In her unskilled apprenticeship's attempt 

To aidant graft her sprout on nature's slip, 



MA¥. ^ 

Infused a virus where she found no taint, 

And made her martyr of the tender babe ; 

For groping Science oft like blinded creeds 

Must needs experiment in sacrifice, 

Till Wisdom crowns her with the irinstership. 

Sore little Tristian suii'erd, laniiai:sl!(jd, drooped, 

A cankered bud^ but still between the rot, 

And his sound core of lite, she gave to him, 

His mother as the vrarding angel stood : 

For during those three years his cradle rocked, 

'Tween Hfe and death, in heavier throes of soul, 

She every day gave him that life anew, • 

Which in less labor she had given once. 

Then mightst of deepest drop the ocean drain : 

But never, Man ! exhaust a mothers love. 

Kind Kature, ever provident in ail, 

Has in anticipation of Man-s aches, 

Endowed him with the fortitude to bear ; 

And patient Tristian, resigned to pain 

Unshrinking bore the scalpel and the probe. 

He smiled but once, when, of his age, a girl 

A buskin, in her arms, her baby called. 

And whilst his life hung on this slender thread, 

AVhenever Death was from the church-bell moaJied 

The village echoed : ^' It is Tristian's knell 1 '' 

Then he would closer to her besom cling, 

And whisper : '^ Mother, it is not for me ! *' 

But hark ! Again the iron-tongue wails DeiiHi, 

And still he is, but he is iatherless ! 

Ah then his orphaned heart could only feel, 

Xot know the loss which he learned all too soon 

From other children's lips that father called. 

Yet all his mother's kin held him their own, 

For sure that love divine had winged their feet, 

When through the blast and snow they succor called, 

Which at the last prevailed. Then most of all. 

As she indeed had owned him from his birth, 

His aged grandmother took him to her heart : 

Thou "kind grandmother's lieait, that harborst all 

A mother's love without her petulance ! 

O Man, if Heaven's blessed thee in the kind 

That thy grandparents dwell amongst thine yet, 

Reflect how awful near their journey's close 

To that dread Power where thou too must go. 

See that thy offspring thy own piirents hold 

As sainted in their souls ; for sure they are 

The, visible links that bind us to our God. 

No callow bird so nestled to its dam, 

As Tristian to his grandmother clung, 

And as his body waxed, his soul grew there, 



Whilst she in bim seemed to rejuveuate. 

Xo fioiired speech it is that she would take 

The dainties from her mouth to give to him. 

When asked, in sport, by them who had remarked 

Tliis rare attachment, Avhich he would save first 

Tf both his mother and his graudam fell 

Into the stream ? He echoek : ^' Both at once ^ 

When from its font his life no longer drew, 

And tliey both sat in the wainscottcd room, 

Wherein the family Spirit was enshrined. 

And he the ucedlu threaded to her hand, 

A pageant by the window shoutinc;- passed : 

" Our Science, to the old, can Youth restore ! " 

J*oor Tristian implored in tugs and speech : 

" (,)uick, grandma, come, and be made young again 

The kind soul sadly smiled, and dried her eyes^ 

'' Fond fool, 'tis but a jesting masquerade/' 

liut his young soul to Ineditatiou drooped. 

And thence, as sadly he regarded her, 

The dreadful thought, like'shadow from the cloud 

Would dark his soul, that there would be a fime. 

How soon he durst not cast, when with her soul 

He could no mor^^ commune; for he knew Deatli, 

And what it meant, in his own fathei-'s loss. 

As on a holiday, the family 

Made pilgrimage to that lone chapled shrine, 

Weak Tristian, too feeble to ])roceed. 

Astraddle on his grandaufs shoulders rode ; 

Then from the flowers of the mead they crossed, 

She wound a wreath for him. No jeweled crown, 

i:s^ot the corona seen in the eclipse, 

]Sot this life's honors, nor the fame beyond, 

Could ever yield him such l^eatitude 

As, spiritualized in memory, 

That wreath aflbrds him tlirougli eternity. 

But on this earth the only certainty 

Is alteration, and a pregnant change 

Upon the household on a sudden broke : 

The fixed pursuit, coevalwith the name 

Was sacrificed, the happy homestead sold! 

Alas ! When ]\Ian, first as a stranger steps 

Across that threshold, which no more is his ; 

There is, this side eternity, but one 

A heavier pass, and that is to the grave ! 

Yea then he treads upon his very heart 

And, if not then, the wound aches afterAvards. 

The family disrupted, part staid near 

The other sought the other hemisphere. 

And with the household's body broke its son] : 

For ]i either of its members knew it more. 



oil, blest with liappiiiess that fjimily, 

Whose members, as they are together born, 

Abide as one till death ! The grief to part. 

As ever then the gap of change is veiled, 

Was solaced by the hope to meet again. 

Some did ; but how ? Alas ! that there are links 

AVhicli severed, after break their fragile splints ! 

Behind his old departed master staid, 

A trusty friend, descended from that land, , 

Which bears its name from being newly found, 

Who from his loyalty conld not be weaned. 

Poor brute, thou sliam'st immortal vanntcnl Man I 

Ouce thy attachment, though on beggar, iixed ; 

Xo dainty bits, no mansion tempts tiiee thence — 

While for advancement, or to keep his own, 

Man's re«dy to abjure his cause, himself. 

Young Tristian. to console his grieving charge 

Showed him the steepled vane upon the churcJi, 

As favorably veered the stift'ning breeze. 

Wherewith his master speeded home again : 

He stared on vacancy, and moaning howled ; 

Fond Tristian tried in vain : he could impart 

But what the present, not the future, b<n^e : 

I'he brute was to his wound denied the l)alm 

And seeking him, whose absi^iu'^e cansed his nclie. 

P>oth far and near, v^hercA er both had been, 

He loamed a strangei- till by grief undone. 

Oh Ma*n, remember still, though seeming less, 

Tpon the test, l>e sonu^ of human kiiul, 

Yet in respect, they're v^orthier tlian that brute ; 

And when thou in that Desperation's strait, 

Which narrows as it darks, seest staggering 

The victim stricken to his heart by grief, 

Pause, for b.e owns prerogative of speech, 

Denied to that doomed brute, and can be sa\ cd. 

In their new^ domicile, an alien then, 

Was Tristian, and to the Parish school 

His mother, with him, his admissiou sought, 

Xot in their right, but in the master's grant. 

The latter answered, that the > ounker seemed 

As aj>tto learn, and he could teach one more. 

Although the consciousness in Tristian's heart 

liOdged deej), thath.e was but a ])ensioner: 

Vet he soon Ncrified the teacher's ken 

When, he beyond his age, attained tlie head. 

As moves the tongue l>etween its counter scales, 

So vibrates 31a n ])etween his gain and loss ;• 

Yet, of the properties he owns within, 

There are some things slionld not be tampered with : 

"Twas in a mnrky winters afternoon, 



8 MAN, 

When merrily, like eheiry blossoms, tripped 

The flaky first on Tristian's jocund heart ; 

Then, in the given lesson, fell on him 

A shadow yet the direr, being- cast 

From stranger ground. It was when hr.sl be read 

The fall of i\Ian and utter loss of all 

And then he knew, what else he had not known : 

That he was wretched ! As lie further read 

Th^t haply Man might, through the Cross, be saved 

Did not illume that shadow from his heait : 

For he, in his bewiUlermrnt, but knew 

The loss was certain, dubious the liope ! 

Then, falteiingin his answer, was set down 

A bench below, where he, in anguish, groped 

Between that shadow and his setting down. 

He i)ODdered this, and meditated that 

Until, he centred on a firm resolve, 

Which, when once fixed in heart, with him ne'er fell 

into that gap, between the Yea and Isay : 

It was, that he\l retrieve his x>titting down 

And, when his soul was strong, to raise that Fall. 

The lirst part he achieved the following day, 

When he vras reinstated to the head. 

Ifow he fared with the other, how he stro\'4^ 

An<l what endured, till he the shadovr coped. 

Shall be, with Man, the burden of our tale. 

At honje lie counselled, with his mothers boDi 

About that shadow, which they had remarked, ' 

Wh(.'n to the Pastor they directed him — 

He, kind old soul, made him his altar boy ; 

But did not raise tlrat shadow from his mind. 

lie bade liiju seek in J^ayer for relief; 

But who can iiee lVon», what ho bears wit it in ? 

Else was he steaded in his fell distress, 

When he, the custoniauv Easter egg>;. 

I'roni his godmotlier, in Ids native town, 

Went carrying home ! Yea, on that hallway bridge. 

In visit, Avhicii was foretaste of its bliss, 

A flash from Heav'n lighted up unseen 

Within his breast assurance he/d have raised, 

As Heaven owned, that shadow from his soul. 

What imitation to tlu^ genuine 

So was, to this beatitude, the sheen 

In which he walked on Corpus Chrlsti day. 

In canopied |)rocession, through the fields, 

When as, v>'ith chorus and the sky-larks' clioir, 

The spring wind played upon the forest-lyre, 

He, too, was happy, knovving others so; 

But felt, once more, the soul's ecstatic thrill 

As, at tliat time, from other hemisphere. 



Where lie liiid planted of his oH'spriug four, 

The grandsire home returned. As relic still, 

Ilis bench forbidden, in the corner crouched, 

Ifike to a sword which in rebellion quelled. 

Hangs in the chamber of that warrior, 

Who, with it, no dishonor had exchanged. 

Ilim, would he, would he not, young Tristian made 

Ilis Mentor : where he'd go, he'd follow him — 

To church — or to the village social inn. 

Where he would sit, as of the company, 

Yet was his earliest boon not tamiiered with ; 

For he, while one, was left to stay a child. 

Then he would list : did earth or move or not ? 

And if it did, vrhat weighed the Prophet's word 

That bade the spheres stand still '? But most his joy 

AVhen on Columbia the question turned ; 

For she to him the Paradise not lost. 

But when he had his ear all to himself 

Would Tristian on his grand father urge 

To tell him all at once what there he saw 

When such an answer palled as afterwards 

Was doled out by the emigrants returned 

From Eklorado's State, as they explained 

That 'tis a marvelous, prodigious land 

And they'd have staid, but — then he qualified, 

And as he added in Columbia's air. 

There was a something uncongenial — 

Beneath that cherry tree on yonder hill, 

Above the Parish messenger, who had 

Embezzled some few florins froni its folks, 

A white smoke upward curled : he shot himself, 

Whereon the old man closed : '• 'twas that my son 

Which, in that country, I could not endure f 

But Tristian jnarveled, whether he did mean, 

That in Columbia a mania raged, 

For peculation or for suicide, 

Or whether Man there prone to tail in kind 

Would thus in wreaking on himself atone 1? 

When his grand father quieted his doubts, 

That their solution would unbidden come. 

His recreation then, to range the woods 

I'or squirrels' nests, or for the mistletoe, 

Wherewith in forest glade, to lime the birds 

Along his grandsire's side. Then Tristian 

ivoamed in such beatific ecstasy, 

As in his lancy felt the Patriarchs, 

When with the Lord they sensibly communed ; 

But scarce had he a half score years attained. 

When he a second time liis father lost 

Wliose flame of life went out, its liquid spent, 



10 MAN. 

And caused tind vuid wiiicli relics' sorrow (ills. 

As on a shaded plat in woody damp 

Where straying snn-beam rarely penet]\ates 

The touch of frost to liMess pallor nips 

The stinted, scent and savor-lacking green ; 

80 now the struggliiig up in Tristian, 

From whom that shadowy never drew its spread, 

Was by Death's visitation levelled down : 

Then, ionesome, sombre to the stricken boy 

The village, footpath, forest, lea and glade, 

For Consolation's rest he nowhere found, 

Save in those spots now hallowed to his soul 

\\Tiere with his grandsire l^e had wandered laU-. 

There in devotion he would stretch him down 

And let his grief its flow. Thus, woe-engrossed. 

He shunned not comrades, nor by them was shunned ; 

For, with an open soul lor sympathy, 

He found himself where'er he met his ki]i<]. 

Still his contemplative and musing bent 

Inclined him from their waste. Yet Avas there one 

Endeared to Tristian in his lonely walks. 

Between the village and the gloomy woods; 

For of the landscape's gross he was a mark, 

And cunning in the sports of held and wood. 

Upon the common's sward the village geese 

He herded, and his rest there Tristian made, 

When from the forest in the beating sun 

Upon his aching head, with quivering limhs, 

He bore the bundled branches of the pine. 

To eke the little purchase for the hearth; 

For limited was their domestic store 

And as, with heaved offload, the bolster roiled, 

He thought, like it, his patience would make soft 

The heavy shadow-burden on his soul. 

Both seated then upon a bencli of sod 

Within his hut of branches quaintly reared, 

AVith exultation greater than could kings 

Of conquests made, they inventory took 

Of all the birds' and squirrels' nests they knew, 

In wood and mead, in quarry and in crag. 

Then sallying spied the eggs, the callow brood. 

And guessed the hour when from their nest they'd tly 

But in the cross bill's nook they never pried. 

oSTot homeward winged his geese then' flight so swift, 

As sped the little herd when he discried 

A line of chorused palmers wind along 

The forest path into the open road. 

Which up the hill led to that chapled shrine. 

Where as they passed, with Lazzaroni mien, 

He claimed the tribute of their charity. 



MAK. 11 

Aud for the gift he iimmbling feigned them thanks j 
Bat scarce their backs were to his face reversed 
When he, with thumb on nose, his cunning praised. 
For this he was rebuked by Tristian, 
Who got almost to loathe the hypocrite, 
But quicklj^ thought, they needed less who gave, 
Than they who took, and censured then no more ; 
Yet was he pat in speech as ever boy, 
Had travelled further than his age gave out 
And could in pious warmth descant upon 
The unctuous and mystic atmosphere, 
Which from those Gothic masterpieces breathes. 
Those sistered minsters, one of which escaped 
Unscathed happily that fall of war, 
AVhich Tristian then feigned he tokened saw 
In those dark clouds, which from the westward piled. 
When for relief of eye he eastward glanced 
There loomed serenely that ancient crag- 
How ominous in proof, is elsewhere told ; 
For he had heard a future conflict's bruit 
J;>et\veen the Teuton and the Latin race. 
And thought 'twould break whenever rose thai pall. 
When past the luncheon, with his comrade shared, 
They scoured the common for the gander's quills 
Wherewith, in writing, to excel at school. 
Poor gooseherd! variegated is the fate 
Of Tristian, and, of that field of life, 
Which he, in boyish contemplation, tilled, 
He barely got the gleaning; oft he thougbt 
AYhat mote his comrade-s be, and whether 1m' 
Was later shadowed by his family tain t 
Wherefor correction is no lasting" cure. 
Yea, earth, not thou the only alchemist ! 
As thou the v^orthless pebble canst convert 
Into a diamond ; so Memory 
Endows with preciousness the least event. 
When life is burning with the glow of hope. 
No lightning thrills the breast that knows no clouds 
Yet on young Tristian's crumbling stock of joy 
Eank spread the parasitic shoots of woe. 
And still resistless as the march of time, 
That gloomy thought, his vision shading darked 
xVU he beheld, and often as he mused. 
Like blot in nature, ghastly stared his doom. 
Yea, then, as worried housewife spies her babe, 
So Tristian waited for his sorrow's lull, 
That he might snatch a spell to recreate. 
God is companion of our solitude, 
And conscious, that His love is wisdom's seed. 
He, shunning all, sought to commune with Him 



12 MA If, 

Within the gloomiest of the forest depths, 

And tliere, beneath the solemn arcade's mnark 

Of lowering pines, the light within wonld shine, 

Xill Irom the awfnl glory it revealed 

Of oar Creator, he in terror prayed. 

Then, buoyed in spirit, he the woodpath sought 

Where, with the doves, across tlie clearing winged 

His upward soul, which to devotion bent, 

Where, through the moss the granite crosses peered 

Above the everlasting dormitories 

Of them, that there by mischief were uudonts 

For this of good or evil deeds was not 

A tell-tale scene, yet do not hence deduce, 

Its gloom suggested the intent to crime. 

For ere those oceans by the world were scanned 

And yet these mountains w^ere its traffic's route ' 

ihe stranger robber tracked his trader-prey 

And reft him here of both his purse and life. 

Yet Passion here, as else her victims struck. 

And often, m these lonely forest paths 

The captor of a female's heart or whim, 

As home from church-ale, village tair, or feast 

He lead his prize, once more avouched his rio-ht 

In deadly conllict 'gainst a rival's heat, * 

And many a cross denotes the mortal feud, 

Between the poacher and the forest-ward. 

Where who sees first, the other slavs unwarned. 

Ihen Tristian bending to the highway's light. 

Beneath a sapliug pine, he feigned as large 

As was that bush, which to the Prophet burned 

Bade greetings to the brood he had espied 

When with his mother through these wilds he trod 

Ah, it IS sweet, to louuge in summer's heat, 

H ithm the silent, song charmed forest glade. 

And there to spy, around decaying stumps, 

The ripe strawberry glint between the weeds ; 

ais sweet in autumn, there to view again 

A flock of finches, like our airy hopes, 

'Now stretched afar, now near, yet circling still, 

Untd their glitter those ripe thistles crovrns, 

When they exult upon the spoil they make. 

As on the breeze, they fling the fleecy chaif : 

'Tis sweet in summer, ere the thunder breaks 

To seek safe refuge 'long the forest's skirt 

Withm the char-coal burner's hut of sod. 

And there, to feign, in storm exulting heart, 

Ihat she there treasured, is then too embraced. 

Ah, sweet his sheen upon the wakened soul, 

As forth the sun on gasping tempest breaks. 

And sounds the shepherd's flute as stretched he lies 



MAy, 13 

Upon the slope of yonder forest cape : 

He monarch then, a sceptre then his crook, 

His minister his watchfal trusty clog', 

His hut his pahxce, which no treason threats. 

For type of meekness all his subjects are. 

Sweet then to view, how Nature's in mtle drips 

And how the distant Alps deck forth their walls 

In sheeted silver, trophies of the strife. 

Wherein the sun was conqueror once more, 

Ere like a hero he succumbed to time. 

Thus Tristian ghidd'ning all that he beheld, 

And by kind nature gladdened back again. 

Encountered on his homepath through the fields. 

An elder buxom lass, who stroked his cheek. 

And when he wished there were no useless weeds, 

To hurt her soft, plump hands, replied to him, 

That they, the lushest green, made cattle yield. 

The richest milk ; that where they grew not rank. 

The soil was sterile, or not well manured. 

And as they ilowers in the summer throve, 

So in the winter the remembered toil 

Of weeding gave a relish to the bread. 

O happy people ! blest your harb'ring land ! 

Be labor's sweat still held a curse and shunned. 

By all the chosen seed to whom it first 

Has been denounced, for you it is no part 

Ot that dire fall, that shadowed Tristian ; 

For them who retch thereon, and not for you 

That libel on the Deity was feigned. 

He musing on, then in that chapel paused. 

As is the country's ancient pious Avont 5 

And as he knelt, the clatter of the frames 

Wherein the images hung on the walls 

Struck on his heart, like wind upon that harp, 

And echoed mystic tunes till then unknown. 

With glance within, and eyes on crucifix. 

Then came to him the boyish strange conceit 

What warrant for beatitude might be 

In the similitude of hair and eyes, 

Between the quick and him portrayed in doom ? 

Whereon he grieved he was not living when 

He, face to face, had seen the son of Slan, 

And could have been of his disciples one. 

Or, if not chosen, then, he pondered on. 

What efforts, hazards he would have endured 

To leave undone that tragedy of Man. 

Ah then of all the bliss he knew or hoped 

He covetted most that Oyrenean's lot. 

Yet had that been, whose lack he thus deplored, 

AVould he have done, as then in soul he vowed'? 



14 MA jsr. 

What Man, to ansAver dares ? But tliis is sure : 

Had Tristian ; as in his best, been there, 

]S'o voice the more had clamored : '' crucify !'^ 

His promptings thus in chapled solitude ; 

Else mused he in the congregated throng, 

For there he marked one cross of revereuce, 

But tipped indicative upon the breast 

Of Power and of Wealth, ^'hile Poverty 

And Humbleness a full stretched cross-stroke drew, 

As ^twere to grave th'cmotion on the heart : 

He pondered, whether witli our (lod that Man 

Familiar more, and this Man distant more ? 

Though it oftendr'd not his soul, this sight, 

Like earth on seed, closed on the thougiits conceived. 

Which sprouted afterwards in varied kind. 

How opposite to this his ecstasy, 

AVhen during passion week within the aisle, 

He fervent kissed the prostrate crucitix, 

And snatched, from there the breath of angels lips. 

Which bore his soul into beatitude ! 

Thou dream awake I And for the first the best, 

AVhen Love sports with the phantasy of Youth 

Ah Maiden ! only when thou hast inspired 

The soul that never felt, art thou of them, 

AVho are of heaven, ere they part from earth. 

"What was to him the dogma's catechism. 

Of whether wine and bread, or both in one ? 

Partook with her, the eucharist was blest, 

^Vlthough to him the wafer was but dough 

But on the eve, as in the village inn. 

He by his mother sat, her opposite, 

He revelled in the blissful memory 

Of Christ's last supper, and the wedding feast, 

AVhere son and mother in each other Joyed. 

Imagination, Innivenly thy boons ! 

When in blest ]!N'ature's jocund spring he roamed, 

< )r led upon the hills his tethered goat. 

Whose milk to him, an invalid, was both 

r>est medicine and wholesom'st nutriment. 

And he for his capricious 'pothecary 

Sought out the juiciest herbs, the lushest green, 

And stript the katkins off the hazel bush 5 

AVhen he descried a violet scented nook 

Embovrered 'neath the black thorn's fragrant snow. 

His soul would re\"el in the i)hantasy. 

That it ^^ith him his angel had euvshrincd: 

AVliat though he knew the gap between her \^ calth 

And his own poverty, to be so wide, 

That he, to cross it, must an ocean span. 

And foimd his bridge upon Imth hemispheres ? 



MAN. 15 

What aim so i'ar, lliat Yontli will not essay ? 

Not Man's attempts, but his snecess is strange, 

And Trislian succeeded to Lis liope ; 

}''or as a soldier wounded to tlie lile, 

Uis body dra^s ^ly, to revi\ ing spring ; 

>So stricken Tristiisn struggled for liis goal, 

And bad attained its gate, when to bis woe, 

Tbat sbadow interposed, and be turned l)ack, 

Altbougb invited in ; tbat bo sbould tlias 

Undo bis own fruition seeras most strange : 

it did not so to bim, ^v\\o did forego 

All tbat can make an Eden of tbis earlb : 

I'or bim tbe Paradise was verily lost, 

And then be bad not with bis sbadow cope<l, 

Whose banefai blight be would not, for bis lilV, 

Heiieet on her be loved more than himself. 

Yea Man ! It is not v»'ell they every dream, 

Were it the happiest, be realized ; 

FoY on thy tree of hope springs many a bud, 

More grateful in its blossom than its fruit, 

And if it were tbe sweetest on tbe stalk. 

i 'oncealed from her, to whom be raised bis love, 

lie nursed it more, as mother does that babe, 

Whicli never by its father has been owned. 

Ibit with a sorroAvful and cpiabny breast, 

With bis grandmother, who bad now attained 

That age allotted, be to gleaning went ^ 

Then from her labor, by distress imposed. 

Was that great heart of hearts correctly iiaiiie*!. 

Ah barrov> ing, to Tristian's filial heart 

To see bis mother rea]> for hire, not self ~ 

To know, tbat be, and his grandmother gleaned 

Frora stranger ground ; ah then he yearning sighed 

Not for broad lands, but for a single rod, 

Hovvcver sterile, so it had been theirs ; 

And yet, though he was seldom l^'ortnne's guest, 

Ne'er luxury i'or Tristian spread her feast 

So luscious sa\'ory, as was the bread 

Baked from tbe ears with bis grandmother gleaned. 

At last the often meditated hour, 

To part for where their hopes })rcceded them, 

<'ame fraught v;itb what shall be hereafter told. 

Thus Man will Avander to a distant strand, 

Away from all that is a part of him ; 

There may he prosper more than be had hoped, 

And lull ap])reciate what he's attained ; 

Yet can be never know, conceive or dream 

What be has left behind. As jolted down 

The country wagon on the village street, 

Tbe night was murky and tbe landscape blealc. 



16 31AN. 

And sympathetic but tlie Autumn's moan : 
The cord that bound them to their native home 
Was wound from off their hearts, and Tristian 
To all its scenes bade not, but grievedj farewell ! 



MA K. 17 



CA.NTO IT. 



CONTENTS. 

TlieBalize; Arrival afc the Port. Strciuge tmd at home iu the 
South ; Departure u^i the River. Death and Solitude ; Love- 
Episode, and the Lovers' Dispersion. Apostrophe to the South. 

O Land !Thou Protean name of many sounds ! 

When thou strik'st on that spirit's instrument 

The human heart, how opposite the notes 

Thy touch evokes ; descending from the thrill 

Of eager immigrant, whose soul reflects 

Thy welcome hack, intensified by hope 

Down to the mute of the indifierent crew, 

And now ascending from the wonted flat 

Of voyage calmly made, unto the ^' Saved ! " 

Devoutly whispered from the broken raft 

Whereon the wrecked are eddied to shore. 

O glorious Land ! raised from that wat'ry waste 

To be Man's ever habitable earth 

In Tristian's heart thy name struck on that chord 

As he then fancied, sounded through the ark 

And later thrilled Columbus' heart in sooth 

When in that isle he found the continent. 

iSTot mere a shift of place to Tristian 

It was the land, which Hope had promised him. 

Alas ! Deluded Man ! thou still wilt dream 

That all thy pleasures spring but from thy aims 

For which thou heedless striv'st, but dar'st not own, 

When thou'st attained them, that thy greater joy 

Perhaps thy all lay in thy struggles' path ! 

Yea, legion is the sorrowing travellers' host 

Who, at their destination, soon espy 

That whence they started, they had better fared ! 

How often blinded Man abides through life 

As they, by drink benumbed, yawn through a show 

Whose curtain's rise they sober see no more ! 

Upon the threshold of that water-aisle 

Which stretched enchanted where his heart adored 

His sanctuary Tristian surveyed 



18 MAN, 

Exultiug in the spectacle lie viewed 

As Art and Nature witli each otlier \Wd 

To j)repossessjtlie comer's wond'ring mind. 

Like ogres risen from the caverned deep 

With lookout spectral as for th'otber world, 

And lurid nostrils^ that like craters heaved 

The Yulcan roused, huge towboats thund'ring liied 

To seize the argosies, their i^rey at bay. 

Here like a hero, when his genius 

Abides in him no more, the noble stream, 

Now in his war with fate, that's lost ere fought, 

Undoes, in three, his force, that should be one 

Ere 'gainst the blue he hurls his tawny host } 

But sundered or united, what's to reck ? 

In vain he struggles who has run his course. 

As the exulting captor bellowed on 

His convoy welcome to his sail-fnrled prize 

Whose echo thrilled the heart of Tristian, 

He with the Hindoo's awe on Gauges' strand, 

In spellbound vision gazed upon the stream 

That rolled his massy grandeur through his breast. 

What though he knew, that up and down those banks 

The Pestilence, like an assassin cloaked, 

Prowled in the fail 1 That brooding in her weeds, 

The mossy tresses of those hoary trees, 

The stricken Land its human harvest mourned ? 

He recked not this : to him the world was new. 

The city loomed in view, a moment more. 

And but for eyes that were observant then, 

His lips had touched the ground before his feet. 

Thus fair the morn, but foul the eveuiug palled 

When ol their fast illusions broke the first : 

As bad it was, it had not been so dire 

Had it too been the last ! Columbia ! 

The bruit is out of thy vernacular. 

That Man more savage, beast more gentle gro\v«. 

Not thus holds Tristian, but rather deems 

The human trait, which makes the strauger friend 

Is by thy freedom's sun more cheered than scorched; 

Yet it is certain that the prunetree which 

To thee transplanted yields but rapid x)lums, 

Of thy exotics's not the only one 

Which in thy soil and air degenerates. 

The walnut neither is the only fruit 

Which, Avhen thou ownst it, is in kernel shrunk; 

Nor yet of spirits is the wine the sole 

That in the transit turns to worthlessness — 

Rare is the household which, when opened once, 

Will fit to close against the entered chill : 

A sister's love was galled to overflow 



MAN-. 19 

In sickness which nigh made her bed of death ; 
The mother^s heart too brittle and too old 
To bend, was shivered, and had ceased to beat, 
Had not kind Heaven then the crevice filled. 
Oh deepest sting- in human wretchedness 
When Man has heart, but only for its pangs ! 
Had there been aught, which could intensify 
The gloom of Tristian's shadow, this had been 
The very cloud, but he ignored his own 
In seeking to alleviate the woe 
Of those big hearts he loved more than himself. 
Alas ! he could not minister to their ache. 
The thorn, a stranger thrusts into our heart 
Will work out of itself, but fest'ring sinks 
Beyond our reach, the one lodged by our kin 
The deeper, as the nearer, they have been. 
As Tristiau his recreation sought. 
He first was in the landscape's vastness lost ; 
Finding no rest in its bleak dreariness. 
He longed, in vain, for some similitude 
Between his new and cherished native home. 
He yearned and sought, yet found it but in Man : 
How fain, with objects, he'd commune of home ! 
Alas ! the thistlefinch he gazed upon. 
Although a pampered pet in gaudy cage 
Was loth to drawl his foreign prison song, 
As though his faded hue reminded him, 
That stranger clime soon ends his minstrel life ; 
Ah, then they but in concert grieved, until 
Young Tristian's melancholy interposed 
Between the two expatriated friends. 
Then to the field he\i hie to view the flock : 
Alas ! the shepherd swayed not with a crook, 
But whizzing swung instead a knotted wlii]), 
And for the faithful dog, a mangy cur 
Would like a stubborn truant skulk behind. 
He found no moon and star companioned cote : 
The tender lodged within a ribald den. 
Last, Tristian within the pine-woods sought 
The honest char-coal burner and his hut. 
To him more than all pomp and palace dear ; 
He found the collier on the debris stretched 
Of uncharred fallen piles of mole-hill size 
Debating whether he could fill his punt 
From out the remnants by his fellows left. 
Eked out with what he might with safety steal ; 
The char-coal burner Tristian sought no more. 
He spied the pines, if haply he could greet • 
His sable squirrels, but he glanced in vaiu 
When lo ! a country wagon jolted past 



20 MAN. 

And strung behind, like on the gallon's hanged 

His friends were shot ! to market borne for food ! 

Ah then he knew he was in stranger land 5 

For naught, that he bad treasured in his soul, 

Could he comi)anion in his second home 

And then his mind was left a dreary dark 

Like to a dome when on the ended feast 

The last light is extinguished. Tristian 

Did not then know, that Nature all abhors 

To duplicate herself; that even boons 

Would in their repetition pall the taste ; 

When this he learned, he did forbear for aye 

To seek a copy where there can be none. 

Then soon he found that in a varied kind, 

His new home also charms and beauties owned. 

Then of its vast himself became a part : 

What though the clime will, with its wasting breath. 

Oft cast the stranger on the fever couch ? 

'Tis sweet when through the open window fans 

The blossom scented breeze from orange grove 

The convalescent's brow, as of the past 

The dream's blest vision still abides through wake. 

And through his heart his native pleasures thrill. 

Like through that shell before his chamber's hearth, 

The echoes rumble from its ocean home. 

When by the roused up heart the head is still 

Upon the pillow tossed, 'tis sweet to list 

In summer's midnight through the tepid air 

The Protean bird, that betters what it mocks, 

And of all tunes but lovers' accents spares. 

'Tis sweet when in the storm or calm of heart 

Our soul is ravished, as that evergreen 

Its lily censers swings through forest aisle 

And AYith their incense nature sanctifies. 

Whilst our fond Taney ruminates of her 

Who, of whatever cluster she be one 

In that bouquet is the Magnolia. 

Sweet are the fields decked in their snowy fleece, 

The carmine cones that glow the Southern heat, 

The orange glistening through their leafy veil. 

The ripening cane that yields the juicy sweet. 

Yet Tristian scarcely had made friends with these, 

When fate's behest again bade him to part. 

For there, too perpendicular the beams. 

Too sudden and too brief his mothers deemed 

The struggle with that epidemic fiend 

Whose killing breath his victims yellow dyes. 

Thus Tristia^n journeyed with his mothers on, 

Who took but sorrow whence they sought for bliss : 

Tiien were those trees the emblems of their hearts, 



MAl^. 21 

Who dreamt it uot wlien those their welcome draped ; 

But now they wandered forth with no regrets, 

For soul abhorred, though innocent the spot 

Where we've experienced ill. As is the flight 

Of geese in winter's night, moaning their honk 5 

Yea, as those melancholy skelet fowls 

Oar through that solitude from swamp to sand, 

So was their u^:) ward journey desolate. 

Nor did the dreary stream's monotony 

Illume the sorrow's shade upon their minds : 

There loveliness is ever on the win g, 

For did it 'light, the ruffian overflow 

W^ould sweep it from those shores. For this so miiob. 

More gladsome to the view those sandy clifts. 

That now and then rise on the Eastern bank: 

Ah none were then of Man's short sighted race. 

Who had foreseen those hills the hot-bed scenes 

Of warfare, death, which they were doomed 

To soon endure. What mental ear so nice, 

That then could list the neariug Future's tongue. 

Which spoke the civil war, w^hose victors' shout 

And vanguisheds' wail withiu those devious glens 

Upon the breeze soon quickened and soon died? 

Thou, Father named of streams ! Thou type of Time, 

As here thou cover'st and there disinter'st ; 

!Now mak'st and then undo'st : Although in peace. 

Thou more by Man's and Nature's violence 

A sepulchre, than yet those ancient streams 

Are by the swoop of War, thou needst not more 

To envy them their havocs' history : 

What though thy magnitude would interpose 

Between thee and their boast, that they were swelled 

By gore of Man, and dammed up with his corpse '? 

Thou now outdo'st them in thy lower stretch. 

Where through the Ages' catacombs, more fell 

Than seen or heard, abroad that nation ghosts 

Which, when ah^eady quickened in her womb. 

Through stumbling was miscarried by Time 

In direr throes, than she'd have given birth. — 

When stern ward stretched that longest eastern arm, 

YouDg Tristian, but for the lack of pines, 

Had deemed the land congenial to his own : 

Oh that their distination then had been 

Those forest bluffs with their salubrious air ! 

Perhaps they then had realized the bliss 

Which sometimes glimmered through their sorrow's pall, 

And Tristian had still communed with them 

In audible and not in silent thought ! 

The voyage ended, they in city made 

A second venture for a happy home ; 



22 MA W. 

Alas ! from what they liad a pest-liouse deemed, 

They walked into their graves ! The elder, hale. 

Beheld the setting, not the rising sun ; 

The younger drooped when scarce the sun was up 

And dropped at noon ! This seemed not fated death, 

But sheerest murder wrought by Pestilence, 

That strangles Man with malice of a fiend ! 

Could Tristian then have had the Father's leave, 

He'd have demanded, w^hether He to Man 

Gave life to only gloat in taking it ? — 

As in the battle's brunt, out from the main, 

Those soldiers stand at bay, indiflerent 

Where from the circling foe, the death shot wings ; 

So reckless, whether he'd be felled or spared 

Stood Tristian. Like a vision in a dream 

Kecurred to him his mother's promise made, 

In earnest moments, that upon her last, 

She would reveal to him a mystery, 

Which, she not living, must explain itself. 

What Tristian, bat to know, had given all, 

Ay even life, in her oblivious trance, 

Was lost and sunk, where not mind's grapples reach. 

Into that spirit's vast from where it sprang, 

For Tristian in his soul was hrm assured 

That it was nothing temporal she owned ; 

But in Imagination's compass, then. 

The needle of surmise but trembled faint, ' 

And would not find her i)ole, until at last. 

He feigned that to his shadow it referred. 

And in that deeming watched its spread the more. 

Beclouded in its dark, now Tristian 

Was stricken, desolate, of all bereft ! 

As severed nerves in wonted motion stir. 

His eyes would wander, and his ears still start 

For them that were not, and yet needs nuist be ! 

Oh sting of Miser}', when breathes that thought , 

Thus was I yesterday, thus am to day ! 

Oh Science, thou, almost omnipotent ! 

How long, ere thy quick searching eye will s])y 

The hidden and component essences 

Of that earth circling pestilence, Avhose breath 

Quells out the spark, lixed in this earthly stoclv ; 

That they, disintegrated, when once found, 

Can easily be deadened in their mites ? 

For science, how far worthier is't to know, 

How life is to be saved, than speculate 

From where, and in what manner, 'tis derived '? 

Thus Tristiau cast, as slow in him revived 

The conciousness, by Death's fell stroke benumbed, 

That he, on earth, was still a part of it, 



MAN, 23 

And that, liowe\'er wretched Mau may be, 

In deeming", or indeed, lie need not search, 

But only halt, and g:reateT wretch will pass ; 

And then, as stung by rivalry, he thought : 

If others, why can I not bear my load ? 

In such a contemplating mood he sought, 

Beneath the ground, who were his all abo\'c. 

As in the pellmell of the battle joined, 

The flurried soldiers for their couirades tix 

\Ylmfs next to hand, as index where thew fell j 

So in the havoc of that pestilence. 

With twigs which in the cemetery grew, 

The token Tristian placed, where they were laid— 

Alas ! like on that Held by Carnage rasped, 

Obliterated Vv^ere the marks he reared, 

And now, the monument he had designed. 

Must stay the one, erst founded in his heart ! 

But heaveus ! what a diff'rent gospel told 

That otiier sacred spot in native land ! 

Where tended by Bememb ranee' rev'rent bauds, 

The marigold, forget-me-not and rue 

Bloomed past a score of years, devoted fresh. 

As when by Lamentation first bedewed ; 

Ah there, intact the hallowed booes will rest 

Till Earth in her convulsions yield them forth ; 

Hut here — Alas ! on them their native earth 

Had lighter lain, for Progress most profane 

When thou outstrid'st the piety in Man ! ~ 

The ground, tAie toiling ancestors enhanced, 

Already by their next posterity 

Is deemed too precious for tlieir lasting graves, 

And novr their sacred dust is sold for clay ! 

O horrors' chaos ! Whither tend'st thou Man I 

It would not be a madnian's vagary, 

For Tristian now, within that city lodged, 

To feign, that in the four enclosing vralls, 

In their component bricks were kneaded in 

His grandani's and his mother's sacred dust ! 

But from such wand'ring we will check tlie mind, 

Till in our tale it has more stepsnre grovrn. 

As broods forlorn, with drooping wing, the bird. 

When Yiolence its treasured nest destroyed. 

So wandered Tristian, not knowing where 

His ousted fondness next should 11 nd a rest, 

When keen Afrliction, as by instinct moved. 

Lodged his aliections in tlie sympathy 

For his adopted land, which was, despite 

Its sorrovrs' yield, deep rooted in his heart. 

And now more cherished since he had divined. 

In his own shadow, that domestic war. 



24 31AJSr. 

Which aftei'Nvards broke on that Southern hind, 

So happy in self-laud, it craved for woe ! 

For, as all creatures in the flesh and blood 

Instinctively their species recognize, 

So kilow the oftspring of the human heart 

Their kindred, unperceived by others' ken, 

Its weird precursor had then newly broke 

Upon the country in that wrangling, when 

That Eldorado for admission sought 

Where it the threshokl strewed with golden sand. 

Scarce had that Warning turned its conjured back. 

When, not like brothers, both the I^orth and South, 

In emulation vied for better claim 

To that vast nature's garden of the West ; 

But sought, like ruffians wrangling for their spoil, 

The one the other to beguile with tricks ; 

What needs to tell, what all who care, know well ? 

Then, like an Alps, it weighed upon the breast 

Of Tristian, to see the country's hap 

Made but a ladder of convenience 

For selfish Worthlessness to climb to place. 

And when the earnest came, to vault like apes 

Upon the side that bragged the richer fruit. 

What this to him ? He listed but the. bruit 

That the portentous struggle with the fate 

Of Man was fraught for both the hemispheres. 

He then believed it, lain would still believe. 

Though when it broke, his moan was all forcwept , 

For it unheeded to the country cried. 

But quickly with the with'riug echo hushed, 

That all Disruption's threats were but a blind, 

A sham, a i:)lay upon the stage of Time, 

Willed by the country to divert herself ! 

Yea, Levity is deaf to Earnestnci^s : 

It is endured, but not consummate yet, 

And what are deemed that epoch's alteri)ains. 

May prove a new one's throes : He then shall speak 

When Truth and Eeason have the country's ear. 

MeauAvhile Columbia do not overween. 

For on the postroad of Humanity 

Eelays are scattered at short intervals, 

And oft, there is less i:)ower in the lead 

Than in the less regarded rearward span. 

!N^ow was he in that sprii;g of*life, wherein 

For coming later, ranker sprout those weeds. 

Which at all hours require the plucking up, 

And though his Shadow as the guardian stood. 

That frowned back from him all frivolity. 

And buoyed his upward spirit in a sphere. 

Pure as the iiether warbled in by larks, 



3IAN. 25 

Where he of maiden mused, who of her charms, 
Would not have made the moon her confidante 
Yet matron bosoms, with unstaid desires, 
Still inward joy, to own the pulse of life, 
For with her love, the angel womnn quits ; 
Howbeit they, who to themselves too good, 
To ever prove themselves to others kind ; 
They, who such insubstantial virtue own. 
That it can cast no shadow, overween 
To own in Heaven, what they missed on earth ; 
Yet they who fell, oft in their human touch, 
Make somewhat compensation for their blame, 
Since, jo3'ing in our kind, is bliss divine. 
But whether sought by Love, or seeking it, 
Like Eve, dames lookj and looking arc uudone : 
Yet what one's balm will be another's bane, 
And let them heed, ^iho in such fondness dig 
They bury not their peace, lor oft, alas ! 
Such pleasure's cradle only i)roves its grave, 
Although, from first to last, 'tis also true, 
N^ot they, alone, are slaves who bear that name- 
How oft, when through his Shadow's thick'ning gloom 
He could not peer, did he implore, that she 
For Avhom his heart its first emotions spoke, 
Should also be his last ! He knew not, love 
Was never first, but it was too the last, 
Aud his so near, for her so far, was now 
Intensified, not lessened by one more. 
For 'twas his destiny which soon befell. 
That he should love'^in both the hemispheres. 
Oh Phantasy, thy dazzling plumage shows 
But like a bird's on wing: wiien locked iu hand 
Its beauty's lost to sight Of females all, 
A predilection Tristian ever owned 
For them wiio are of goodly height and bulk ; 
And as he vearned, as did that Indian maid 
Who cried to him she loved : '' Why catch me not F' 
O bourn unseen, between design and chance ! 
There came a vision in full womanhood. 
That owued what nature vaunts aud art essays. 
To shape that heaven's realm, the female form : 
Her brow sublime, like tow'ring mountain shone. 
Where under sped her eyes, twin Mercuries 
With longing winged, to spy their counter mates ; 
Her mouth the censer whence that incense heaved 
Whereon the raptured soul to heaven rose ; 
Her stately neck, like templed pillar firm ; 
Her breast, like to the bow of promise, arched. 
Held two Olympian hills, where Fancy drooped, 
Her>self outdone. Her massive rounded arms, 



26 31 AN. 

Like to Bellona's nerved to strike, avouched, 

What they embraced, was held iu heaven's bounds, 

Whilst her soft, tapering cherry-blossom hands, 

Quick with the beat of Expectation's pulse, 

On sight would gripe into the breast of Man ; 

Her waist, an armful of deliciousness. 

Proclaimed a woman for a god on earth ! 

And thus, with all her riches bared to view, 

As never student by a statue rapt 

Stood Tristian then, as trembling he adored 

The Maker in his work, his masterpiece ! 

She parleyed smiling like a sleeping babe 

With Tristian, that she was wretched too; 

That she had loved but once, and there where too 

His fancy rooted grew ; that he was dead. 

And had been like him, as they had been twins; 

Then gentle, like a dove-hen, with desire. 

While telliog hers, she asked his history ; 

Besought his sympathy, implored in tears. 

That he would not deny her wooing him 

To be her friend ; then grieved his mother's death 

Whom she, if living, had as sister loved. 

This was the breeze, that wafted her to i)ort. 

Was it deception '? Never feign it, Man : 

An angel's face can hide no serpent's tongue. 

Oh Woman ! never from thy friendship springs 

The flower, love, for it is love itself. 

That word, hrst whispered to a maiden's breast, 

Unfolds it like the breeze the buttoned rose. 

But when it first breaks from the woman's lips 

It is the belted gale, that strikes the heart. 

And with a demon's wrench makes it its own. 

Yet in this gush of passion, Tristian 

Was wary, for, in his philosophy. 

He deemed such joys did on perdition float, 

As oil on water. Then she, love's adept 

Wonld tutor him, and by such lips i^rofessed. 

What recks it, whether wit or stndy prompts ? 

Art is but nature from a mediate hand.— 

Howbeit they both roamed in tropic clime, 

And their aft'ection sprouted like those shoots, 

Which from the Banyan tree take root again. 

There where the stock is nursed. Not of this earth, 

Has monarch ever been so prodigal 

As she with matron liberality 

Was kind to him with love's' prerogatives ; 

His youth impelled, his conscience interposed, 

For 'neath his Shadow 'twas a tyrant grown, 

That, once for all, had bidden not to leap 

The one impediment, that lay in way. 



Tlieu not lier lemau he, who would not have, 

Or have for aye, yet she was all to own, 

And though had loved before, was not of those 

To whom the lover as an angel came 

And as a devil left ; nor flower she, 

From whom past lovers each have plucked a leaf 

And only left for him, who takes for aye. 

The cheerless pistil, as it were for seed ; ■ 

For she, of mind and hH^dy, was as fresh* 

In savor as on nature's pristine stalk. 

Yea, Doubt ! thou art the condiment of love 

When cunningly adapted to the taste, 

But something kin to thee at times will dart 

Like- burning sulphur in the trusting breast. 

To jump all hindrance, she impetuous urged 

That on clandestine wings, love gladdest flew : 

In midnight's thickest pall, he bore his prize 

Into the curtained carriage when, land in, 

As fast as hoofs could strike 5 by rail and stream 

Confounded was pursuit in zig-zag course ; 

Then to the port, across the sea ! they fled 

In his imagination, and— both staid, 

For if not honest in his own esteem, 

He deemed himself as nothing more than naught. 

Last, he enforced the only way, for straight, 

By which they could each other own for lite : 

As 'twere a mandate given from above. 

She quaffed his words, and their fulfillment vowed 

In glow of heart, and flow of tears, as 'twere 

The opened heaven on the pledge had closed j 

And yet this promise owned a fickle core ! 

O Woman ! buttressed by the present Man, 

Thou'lt stand against the very Hercules; 

But he away, thou turn blest of thyself. 

She sobbed, implored, and shrieking clasped his knee, 

That he'd forgive, and she'd essay once more -, 

Then wept, as if her heart, dissolved with grief. 

Were gushing through her eyes, but could not touch 

His resolution bottomed in his soul. 

Where never passions' storms and billows stirred ; 

Anon by woe undone, she swooned in sooth : 

As well into a corpse, whose like she was, 

Kecall the vital spark, as word he passed. 

Then, as to self, he minist'ring to her. 

Assured her, Avhen reviA^ed, that he forgave, 

But that on earth, not the cement was owned 

To mend her broken vow; yet they'd stay friends, 

As then for life, so for eternity. 

This is not singular, but strange, O strange! 

She, who so burned in passion, that it scorched 



28 AlAN. 

Her resolution's wiug, when far aA\ av , 

The fuel that had fed it, with staid heart 

And Autumn-mellowed reason, for mere peace 

Achieved the feat she theu for Eden failed. 

Thus they, whose souls were to each other lit, 

As are both ej^es, yet met in destined shock 

So violent, that like colliding stars. 

They shot, rebounding to the country's ends ; 

And now the spray of Minnehaha plays, 

ISTot to her outward, but her inward glance. 

As day by day, she there still ruminates 

Upon the problem, whether those two hearts 

That sundered ache, united had been blest ; 

Whilst there, where first that roaring welcome hushed, 

More than a household's head in panic's pinch, 

That he some pennies saved in easier times, 

Exulted Tristian— since the mere Event 

Is but the stem, and Memory the bloom — 

That for this dearth, his shadow made of life, 

Instead of yielding to the storms of youth, 

He had distilled ttie only rose it bore, 

To be a lasting savor to his soul ,• 

And grateful now^ its virtue proved itself, 

When he had strayed into that baleful air, 

Which his grandfather erst could not endure. 

Yea, as he queried with himself: '' What seeks 

An honest Man in this Corruption's marf? " 

He prayed in soul, not for a whirlwind, sucli 

As took Elijah up, but for that earth, 

Like eggshell crushing, fiery hurricane, 

Upon the sun, to speed him whence he was. 

Oh wretched South ! As thou, enamored erst. 

Thy Slavery's fruition magnifiedst, 

So when that arbitration willed by thee, 

Against thy bias fell, in maudlin thou 

Exaggerat'dst thy plight, and fain wouldst shirk 

The execution of the stern award. 

But now, in sooth, thou'rt stricken to thy core, 

And there is none to deign thee sympathy. 

The noblest of the earth have in our time 

Owned it to Ireland, Poland, all the lands, 

E'er doomed through proper fault, or stranger's wrong, 

But all the world knows but thy scarlet cap. 

That's now the age's badge of happiness, 

But mocks, in spirit thee, like France, in blood. 

Yet as the trifling crowd in fashion's rout 

Eye but the ribbon on the guest enforced, 

And will not ken, that he is none of them ; 

So superficial Man mistakes thy state, 

And takes for granted what the label reads 5 



MAN-. 

Xoue save the wronged eaii leel the libel's stiug, 

And yet, for centuries, shall Time essay 

Ere she a like to thine can fabricate. 

Shalt thon have succor '? Look, and but despair ! 

The wronged in Europe are with neighbors blest, 

AVho keep surveillance on tlie conqueror. 

And force him, either to let go his prey, 

Or rule it for its weal, but here, thou know\st : 

'' The whole unbounded continent is ours/' 

Tlie world forgets, tliat to the African 

Thou gav'st civilization ; neither recks 

What he has paid for his, what she for hers, 

But has decried, as crime, that slavery. 

The onlv means, whereby his continent 

Shall be redeemed; whereas thy sin has been, 

That bv relaxing hold, as he progressed. 

Thou didst not let him go, when civilized. 

Seek therefor thy relief in but thyseU, 

And from that sea of falsehood rescue Truth. 

For now by Heavens ! didst thou charter own, 

Would not oppressors prove who're now opi-»rcsse.l '? 

Lay hand on heart, and answer to our God ! 

Though Tristian vouches only for himself, 

Yet, that thy penalty thy trespass tops, 

He'll testifv for thee to all the world. 



30 3fA jsr. 



CA^TSTTO III. 



CONTENTS. 

Tho Spirit's Advent. The book of Genesis. His Shadow raised from 
Tristian. There never has been a " Fall of Man." 

Thus far, our tale of Mau lias been of hiiu 

An individual, but hence from him, 

Like fan from handle, shall our story's theme 

Unfolding, throngh the generation spread ; 

And as the figures on that ornament 

Glint indistinctly through the folded streaks, 

So vaguely is the bnrden of our tale, 

Betokened in the leaves that now are turned. 

Thou Eeader ! If thy brain like dainty hand, 

Be tender only from the lack of nse 5 ' 

If thou, from nature's, or from habit's stress, 

Instead of diving iu the dei^hs of thought, 

Canst but discreetly iu its shallows wade, 

The Anthor warns thee, he shall take his plunge 

There, whence the billows common Gossip's shore 

But seldom reach. Consider the profound ! 

Its very density shall buoy thee up, 

If thou but once take heart ! But if, too gross 

Thou to the spirit prove, thou needs must hail 

Those cruising, everwary ministers, 

Who dare but on the outskirts of the Main 

To rescue sinking souls; for he will on 

To those arcana with no backward glance. 

Now Tristian was in that stage of life. 

When Man's allotted years, like summer days 

Teem fullest with their time, and on him grew 

His shadow still, which in his vigor's prime, 

Less formidable, than as erst, now seemed. 

From all the olisprings of the human mind, 

Or tongue or pen born, he assistance waived: 

Philosopher or Prophet, Bard or Seer, 

Profane or sacred, all were uninspired 

Against his shadow, which them overlapped. 

Yet far from him despair, for fixed within 



MAlf. 31 

Was coufideuce of succor, founded on 

That visitation erst upon tliat bridge, 

Which vouched to him, his shadow should be raised. 

And that, before the chord, which never snails 

Had rushed his life across that cataract 

It can ascend no more! Yet knew he too. 

That he could not anticipate the time, 

Well known to him, of his delivery. 

As still it neared, he marked not months and days' 

But, heave by heave, his very breath. At last I 

When, with no throes, no symptom or portent, 

Nor other i)remouition than that lirst, 

Behold ! the spirit from the tree of time 

Dropped in his presence like a ripened fruit. 

As 'twere a prelude to that earnest boon, 

Had he not, by the play of phantasy, 

Eehearsed the advent of that destined bliss, 

By its fruition he had been undone. 

The Stranger Spirit thus announced himself: 

'' Of introduction be there no ado ; 

I am assured, thou art prepared for me : 

ISTot that I'd have the own so keen a ken. 

As that Eevealer, who could see a voice ; 

Nor yet that thou, who wouldst see nothing less 

Than all in front, shouldst be content with shift. 

As was that Prophet, when to him was shown 

The Power's rear. I am content to knovr, 

Thy brain is suitably in order iixed. 

That, where I'll lodge, I shall not be annoyed 

With raising of accumulated dust. 

The brushing down of cobwebs, and the like." 

''Dispose of me as thou confrontst me now. 

And in what thou hast come to second me. 

Be principal. Thou to thy charge must be 

Congenial, else hadst thou not been willed ; 

More of thy character I do not know, 

Nor make account. Thou canst not part from me 

In sadder plight, than thou beholdst me now ; 

Nor fear I scath from thee, for never were 

The conquest of a single Man thy boast. 

Whoever thou mayst be, and what thou art 

Shall be best demonstrated in thy deeds. 

Not in thy name, which recks not, since on earth 

Confounded are the designations all : 

Now Lucifer is Satan, and, anon. 

It means the Son of God, But verily, 

Bear thou the light that shall my shadow raise 

And, if it be, that Spirits may own pride, 

I'll hold thee in my soul, as 1 can none 

From fable or from woman sprung on earth, 



32 MA 2^. 

Whatever be their names. Thou kuow'st, I next 

— Since Life is naught, if naught be made of it — 

Would quaff of knowledge from its very sea, 

Not pant for driblets that are theuce exhaled ; 

And if appreciation yield desert, 

I am entitled to prerogative, 

For I have never juggled with the worth 

Of Knowledge, Eeason to myself or Man " 

" When Man wants nothing more, he owns but naught, 

And true with him, althought it is but meet, 

That Satan is more welcome when he brings, 

Than Angel when he takes. But Tristian, 

Know I am one who either must undo, 

Or be myself undone, yet were my charge 

A scathful one, I'd ever stay inert, 

For 'tis the Advi rse Spirits' arch-delight, 

When evils and abus's, which long ago 

Should have been felled, are licensed still to live. 

Thy gentle natui e and thy strenuous soul. 

Thy struggling also have I well remarked. 

And had, ere this, to thy assistance hied, 

Had I not lacked that charter which thou knowst : 

But now demand thy fill, I shall comply." 

" Oh gracious Spirit ! Thou beneficent ! 

Thou know'st, a shadow or a sorrow called. 

That woe, my other self, is but that Fall ! 

Of that relive me, and a happiness 

Unrivalled, save in thy own spheres, is mine; 

This earth, and all its havings, outside me, 

For everlasting change in ownership, 

Kow got, now lost : my soul is but my own, 

And never can be by another OAvned : 

What\s past, what is, what comes, is but my soul !" 

" As if thy life were hanging on a thread, 

I'll haste to raise that Shadovv' from thy soul.. 

As I to give, so be thou apt to take. 

And though thy chief of traits be earnestness. 

Yet, for this once, draw from its inmost core, 

As if this were thy conscious hour of death : 

Thou Shalt be cured, where even thou wast stung; 

Here lurks thy foe, his home vrell called " The Book," 

And be the stress still on the definite, 

Since, with their Teacher, 'tis the only book 

The chosen Seed did exev own or know. 

And holy 'tis because 'tis holy called ; 

But Tristian, thou know'st, the Adjective 

It but to cast upon the Substantive, 

Whereof it forms no part, but hangs thereon, 

Like was] vn est on the wall, until it drops 

By wear of time. As T now strike the text. 



MAN, 33 

Heed thou, 'tis well to challenge everything, 

What lies in tampering Fabrication's reach : 

In the beginning, God created earth 

And heaven" ; This beginning only dates 

Six thousand years ago. Before that time, 

Where dwelt our God, since Heaven there was none / 

And Whence the matter ibr this universe f 

Whence did Himself his own beginning take t 

Did He create Himself, or had He too 

Creator, but six thousand years ago ? 

Thy mind I'll steady v;ith my futaro lore, 

Though now it must, as in a chaos, whir, 

And though I am aware, that since a chihJ, 

Thou learn'dst to wonder, ere thou soughtst to learn. 

Yet put this lirst of questions to thyself : 

How were it, were all this a dark and void ? 

And, when thou art familiar with that thougiit. 

Connect with it that other kindred one : 

What has prevented it from being such 2 

Then, when confounded in astonishment, 

Thou'lt ^ml thy center, as th05i wilt rctiect. 

This universe wears not, needs no repairs; 

A master madcit, not a journey-man ; 

And as, forever, in their circling roll, 

The spheres mii-4t change, the Architect; remains. 

As, by the circles in their trnnkf^, thou knowst 

The age of trees, so by the layers traceil, 

Upon the stock of progress reared by Man, 

Thy mental ken may spy the length of time, 

This earth in present phase and order swings ; 

And what she vras before her last decease 

She whispers to this offs})ring from her grave.'' 

*' Oh Spirit now my Shadow 'gins to stir ! 

O tarry not ! but quicken ! raise it all ! 

^Vlready do I see, how day by day. 

That Lord wanes less, as larger grows the world. " 

" Be warned, that tabling of His attritutes, 

On Man or Isame, makes them not Deity : 

Hence well discriminate between the God, 

Who made this world, and him feigned by the book ; 

And known by that, or by that other name. 

Which Man has kindly deigned to share with hi a), 

Wrong not the chosen Seed by claiming him. 

Since he is only theirs, and they but his. 

We now encounter in the book its first 

Of miracles : there were three da^s and nights 

Ere God created sun, and moon, and stars I 

Thou hast assured me, that vrith reason thou 

Hast never juggled : how accountst thou this :*' 

'^ It is too true ! Had I been told by Man, 



34 MAN. 

There were three offsprings of no parent got, 

I would have spurned it as a trifling jest, 

But uttered by the book, I only kenned 

The teller, not the tale. Yea, Spirit mark ! 

I too, had the temerity to ask 

Of God, Avhose reason I thus stultified, 

To let for everlasting live that soul, 

AYhich in probation I have thus abused, 

Into a pigmy crushed ! Had I then died, 

How Avretched had been my account to Him ! 

What more than sheer apology, excuse f 

Alas ! we do not know the boon of boons : 

That God is not as He is feigned by Man ! " 

" Let not such accusation throe thy soul, 

For thou Shalt know, as thy acumen grows, 

ISiot thou, nor else, nor yet the book's to blame 5 

And at this outset ever bear in mind, 

When Man lacks house, a shed suffices him. 

And he began with less. ^^ To light the earth 

Created were the snn, the moon, and stars." 

As 'tis required in God's economy. 

That great should benefit the less, so too 

The less must needs subserve the greaters' ends, 

And which the greater, which the less, thou knowst. 

ISosv be thou wary, lest thou also i)lunge 

In that hiatus, which before thee yawns : 

How first, it has engulfed the chosen seed, 

And other nations, thou't hereafter learn. 

Yea, thoagh discovered, and explored, this day. 

Its victims, as b}^ instinct, throng that throat, 

Whose vent is to i^erdition : kenst thou it "? 

'Tis where the book, although so scrupulous, 

Forgets to tell, that all the universe 

Had been in motion set ! Ah, Tristian 

JJ]}on that axis all the knowledge turns. 

As on this earth, so on the spheres beyond. 

And yet, how few who see, can righly judge 1 

For, as thou standing on yond river's bank. 

Wilt in the eddy, 'neath thy feet behold 

The waters upward flow, whilst further out, 

Thou'it see the rushing main its current sweep ; 

So by sheer force, of her own impetus, 

The moving universe her outskirts backs. 

And rounds, by counter course, into her rear : 

Thus Man, as nearer, bnt the counter sees. 

Of w hat, in steady course, rolls on beyond. 

" In his own image God created Man " : 

Thou never canst behold a human face, 

But art remembered of his Maker too. 

Who takes delight in Man, else Man were not. 



MAN'. 35 

No soul, on earth so good, but Evil is 

Its passing' guest, aud with the worst, at times 

^Tis not at home. " G od saw that everything 

He made was good " : If for that " good" thoult read : 

" Essential for the Universe, '^ thoult ken 

Thy why of all, that's counter to the good. 

" Of knowledge's tree of good and evil thou 

Beware to eat, lest thou shalt surely die" : 

Thus runs the fable in that Paradise, 

And through the Prophet thus in Palestine, 

Imputed for the Christ : " That he may know 

To choose the good, and to refuse the evil. 

He shall of butter and of honey eat ^' : 

The book against the book ! choose which thou wilt. 

Was this to test the quality of Man ? 

Is God a tyro, that, like human kind, 

He only knows the goodness of His make, 

By putting it to proof? But know, Oh Man ! 

That ignorance is death, nnd knowledge life. 

As well the book might have forbid thee air. 

And yet expect thy l3ody to exist, 

As to prohibit knowledge to thy soul, 

Its very essence, and its sustenance. 

Yea, Tristian, thy soulfhas never dreamt 

For what that tree was feigned in Paradise ! 

Remember Moses wrote that Genesis : 

He was of Levi's house, for whom it bore 

The priesthood's fruits, but for the chosen Seed . 

Stupidity, save in theology : 

Dead to monopoly, it still does live. 

To feed the progeny of ignorance. 

The other tree sure in the center stands. 

Where generations, one to other, link. 

The Lord's laudation of himself had scarce 

Cooled on his lips, ere his creation he 

Discovered flawed, in that he had forgot 

A mate for Man ! To make the universe. 

He had exhausted his material. 

And, though Man sought his mate amongst the brutes, 

He found it not : thus woman chanced to be 

That blest creation of an after thought ! 

So says the book, let woman own its praise ; 

But sure, if woman was not in design. 

When was the form of Man in model drawn, 

His form must after have been cast again. 

Else woman had not found her mate in him, 

Of which remolding silent is the book. 

Mark too, how knowing, in his ecstasy 

To own a mate, Man waxed, as he avouched, 

That he should leave, what then, he neither owned, 



36 MAJ^. 

Nor ever kuew : liis parents for lils wife ! 

How questionable that advice may be, 

It was most fitting for biuiself, since be 

Nor fatber nor a motlier bad to sligbt, 

And was aye limited to bat one wife, 

Unless be in that laud of Nod bad wooed : 

For, reverend Crony, bow should be have known", 

Man can of fatber, niotlier have but one ; 

But as to S])Oiises? — well themselves know bes{. 

We'll noAV essay that Ser])ent and tiiy Fall ! 

If thou art not prepared, so signify. 

And we'll adjourn, till tliou aitbett(*r i)raeed." 

*' Ob, thou a master in thy potency ! 

I'm cured ! My Shado\\''s gone ! It is exhaled ! 

I'm risen from the dea<], and through my heart 

The blood does rush as ne\er felt l)efor(^ : 

Go on ! I am a spirit as tbyselt! ^' 

^'I shall proceed, as it thou still wert d'»v\ii. 

To edily thee for all coming time : 

Though evil be a serpent, never dream 

That in a serpent's form it could allure. 

'• The Serpent subtile more than any beast 

That God bad made. " A strange admission this. 

That all was not dovenatured ere that fall. " 

*' Yea, Spirit, 'tis no more a miracle, 

That then the Serpent spoke, and in that speecb 

Forever lost the gift, but wonder is, 

That Man will still persist to crush bis mind, 

That from its wretched vv^reck be get the stutV 

For other myths, to buttress up this first ! 

That be will, fabling, sin against the Truili, 

And then delude himself, he owns a faith ! 

Why feign of Cherubim and Seraphim 

To be the guardian angels of mankind, 

When Gabriel, with but one stroke of sword, 

Could have exterminated for all time 

All evil from the earth, as Satan then 

Lay in that Serpent crouched, on ruin bent ?" 

^* Ah Tristian, didst thou yet never note 

How striving devils will bestir themselves 

To do a needful thing, upon the eartb, 

Whilst in their sanctified suftlciency. 

With folded wings, the angels moping laze, 

And for no cry will incommode themselves ? 

Bebeve the Spirit, me who shall exist 

Beyond the transformations of this globe. 

Were, what is Satan, what is evil, called, 

To be expatriated from the earth, 

Mankind would hunger for their coming back. 

The fruit was eaten, and the pain was fixed : 



MAN. 37 

It is, lliat IMan imisl die, wlien iVFau would livo ; 

Was Man thus triokod ? Have faitli in God, O Man ! 

Do not, in soul debasi 11.14' i.i^noraneo, 

Attribute to liini such a tiekieness, 

As never father, short ofniadsnan owns : 

To make his ehikl a wretch forever more, 

Because, forsooth, it disobeyed him once : 

In very love. He has created thee, 

And do not feigii, that it could cool so soon ; 

But let us probe : the argument is brief, 

Yet sure and fixed as very life and death : 

Had Man not eaten the forbidden i'ruit, 

Or had he eaten of the tree of life. 

He, and his oUspring, had forever lived : 

Supposing' this were so, liow^ would it score I 

This little earth, of iixed capacity, 

That's with a single generation stocked. 

Could never feed three hundred times the more ; 

Did all, born since that fabled Fall, now live. 

They'd scarce have standing, much less living room : 

In many lands, and those most civilized, 

Man first must have a charter in his means, 

Ere he can get his kind In marriage bed ; 

And even countries of the widest room 

Own many a household, where the parents both, 

In appreliension it would wax too rank 

Beyond their might, have tacillj'^ agreed, 

To sacrifice themselves in continence ; 

AVhile, as of old, that empire of the San, 

Already population overstocked, 

In dread of choking from its density, 

Still through that horror seeks to thin it out. 

And, O Delusion ! mock in pristine grin. 

That Man believes thy table 'gainst his truth ! 

Xear where thou feign'dst, that Man was doomed to die- 

O horror to relate ! this very day. 

In Persia's Capital, the huddled poor. 

Enforced by Famine's pinch, not War's distress, 

Forestall the worm in its monopoly. 

While Man, for fabled hell, ignores this real. 

ITea, learned noddles, in that Albion, 

Are at this moment knuckled to disclose. 

How she her swelling plethora of Man 

May either stay, or elsewhere place on earth ; 

Yet 'fore her ])ulpit break the pious hearts, 

Because that Fall brought Death, and all those woes. 

And Man lost everlasting life on earth ! 

Oh Ignorance, how wonderful thy reign ! 

Hence know, if Man would have a ceaseless life, 

Before he ask it, let him first forbear 



38 jlIA jsr. 

To push the present generation out, 

By thrusting in another ; then anew, 

May the Creator counsel with himself. 

And reconsider his decree of Death. 

Thus it is plain, as yonder sun to sense, 

In his creation has been predesigned, 

In common fate with all, the Deatli of Man ; 

And being fixed, nor his obedience, 

Xor his transgression, could condition it. 

Hence, now as blossom, now as ripened fruit 

Still must Man's offsprings from the tree of time, 

In varied stages, drop : for dainty Death, 

One ear of corn is gathered when in milk, 

The while its neighbor's left to crystalize. 

So when it falls on friend, or on thy own, 

^o longer call inscrutable that Death, 

Which from the first has been decreed by God. 

As fell for thee that evil tree, the Fall ; 

So with its crash is crushed that sequent curse. 

Which thou canst not endure from human lips. 

But which thou feelst, as false, when put on God. 

If there be need, this ground, His earth be cursed, 

Then shall that devil's task not be usurped: 

'Tis not in sorrow Man eats of the ground ; 

The sorrow is, when he thereof to eat, 

Has naught. Were Man exempt from sweat and toil 

Of body and of soul, instead the lord, 

He were the sloth, in the created All. 

The serpents' poison, as the others' all, 

The sun from first distilled, and will to last. 

Not then the Serpent went upon its back, 

Nor had it legs to VN^alk, nor wings to fiy j 

For creeping thou beholdst its belly formed. 

And if it now eats dirt, it did from first. 

Yet, more than Man, are swine and birds of prey 

The serpent' most exterminating foes, 

For at the very moment Moses feigned, 

That it had ruined Man in Paradise, 

Mankind in Asia and in Africa, 

Adored the Serpents as their household gods. 

Bemember this, when I the sequel sliow. 

The Woman is not more the supplement 

Of Man, than he of her, and what to him, 

She in subjection own, is physical. 

And shared in common with her gender's whole; 

Nor in the wrong direction, more than he. 

Knows she the readiest way. Which shall prevail, 

Depends upon the soul's, not body's strength. 

As to conception, and to bringing forth. 

Whose throes, all with the womb, partake with her, 



MAN'. 39 

t 
The woman ever makes it lier own clioice, 
Which one, she for the other will forego : 
To scan, how cunning, both the Man and she, 
Now tamper in that choice with Heaven's boons, 
Would strike a discord in my even love. 
The same economy, that has ordained 
The death of Man, necessitated too 
His quit of Paradise as he increased. 
For Eden, as a somewhere on this earth, 
Was but a homestead, limited in space. 
Eem ember in that Eden, Tiistian ! 
The fable only lost, what it had staked, 
For Moses never speaks of other life, 
And all that woe's the bastard progeny. 
Which priestcraft has begotten on the myth. 
If thou, ere my adv^ent, hadst of that Lord, 
Owned that opinion, AThich thou hast now. 
Thou couldst not have for better warrant sought. 
Than in the one, which he had of himself, 
AVhen he confessed, that Man, then fallen Man ! 
Through knowing Good and Evil had become, 
As he himself ! The inner sense of this 
Thou Shalt lay bare as thou'lt advance in lore. 
Thus we with Man depart that Paradise, 
To him forever, never lost to thee !" 
'' Thou Everlasting and Beneficent ! 
Do thovL bless Man, as even thou bless'dst me ; 
Hear thou his sorry plaint, that to regain 
That Paradise, so crossing are the roads. 
That thousand guides cry out, he's on the wrong, 
Whil'st but his fee'd one vouches he goes right. 
End thou this tantalizing agony. 
And tell him, that he seeks what never was : 
Its character, as fabrication, brand 
Upon that Eden for all coming time ; 
Yea, as a poison do thou label it. 
That none partake it, save they have been warned, 
For it is sinister, pernicious, fell ! 
It, with the name of God, insinuates 
Into the tender soul that sting of loss 
Which, though Man feign it by Redemption drawn, 
Still leaves its ache behind. O Spirit, do't. 
That God by man be known, as He is felt, 
Not felt as known from there ! Consider thou, 
A thousand years may through the Future roll, 
Ere thou again, or like, will visit earth. 
The while, rank Falsehood, from the Fable sprung, 
Will choke the Truth, however it may strive." 
•' Remember, only to thyself I've come, 
Not to the multitude. Though dead the myth, 



40 MAN'. 

Still froths the curse, which it against the spread 

Of knowledge has denounced. When comes the time, 

That knows thee apt, and perfect, in ray lore, 

Then, by myself, at large shall be j^roposed 

For action what thou premature hast broached. 

Then, knowing all, in judging of details, 

Thou shalt not take offence, how seeming ought 

Therewith abound. As in the Physical, 

So in the Spiritual universe, 

There's nothing self-begotten : ail events, 

Like bodies, must have their progenitors, 

Although, like these, oft barren in themselves. 

Thus Moses gave occasion for the Christ, 

And only for that Fall, thyself hadst been 

By Spirit's visitation never blest. 

But I will on and further thee in lore : 

*' He and his brother made a sacrifice j 

Eejected was the harmless one in fruit ; 

Accepted was the one that cried in blood." 

The blood reigned then, as still it domineers 

Whilst, in the spheres reiiected, rolls this earth. 

All this v\'ere not, if of the human race, 

There had been but one Man : when there were two, 

There rose antagonism, conflict, death ! 

Of all, what Man calls Evil in this life. 

There is no more prolific Spring than this : 

It is indeed so deep, that thou shalt sound 

Its bottom only, in the end of Man. 

In that first oifering^bear thou in mind. 

When man destroys, on earth, the gifts of Ood, 

He offers to the Adverse, not to Him. 

Mark too, how that immunity to Cain 

Was Lamech's charter to those foes of Man, 

Who are the greater, as the more they slay, 

For still its magnitude enobles crime. 

Xo longer, Tristian, thou sighst regrets, 

xYs from thy infancy, that Man is not. 

As were those chronic Cronies, blest with life. 

Of near a half a hundred score of years, 

For now thou knovrst, the same economy, 

That needs the death of Man, forbids he live 

Beyond the time, in his creation fixed. 

But know, the Author of the Genesis, 

More skillful, by tne chary using of 

His scant material, could make it stretch, 

Wherewith a universe of means at hand. 

The brains he has inspired can never cast." 

" O Spirit ! there the serpent strikes the tooth. 

Whose subtle poison most insinuates 

Itself into the onward, striving soul, 



31 AN. 41 

Where, rankling at the core, it blasts for life ! 

Yea, better were it, that mankind at once 

Did hear a general warrant for their death, 

Than to be told, that they degenerate 

Still from that Fall nuto the end of tini(.'! 

Now Spirit, verily, I mourn no more, 

That I lived not when giants were on earth, 

For if there ever have been such in bulk, 

The worse for them, for tiiey are to this earrh 

Ko more adapted than this earth to them, 

Save to the giant-mind, that can expand 

Oo-iniinite with all the universe! 

(Jotemporaneous with them vrere too 

Those sons of God : Maa knows of only one; 

If thou wilt deign, Pd hear thy lore on them.*' 

" As they are uttered by the book, so still, 

Be their paternity avouched by it; 

It tells thee, that their mission was on earth. 

To come unto the daughters of mankind, 

And that their oiTspring were, of miglit, renowned 

iS'ow Tristian, mark, ay make a note of it, 

How true that Lord avowed, when he coDfessed, 

That Man was like to him, for thou shult ken. 

That he, when failing, no prerogative 

Has over Man ; that like him too, ala:> ! 

He must demolish his own ediiice, 

And all because he did neglect to brace, 

In its foundation, but one sliding stojic ! 

For his omission to desj)atch to IMan, 

When tempted, as thou aptly .'aidst, but one 

Of his officious principalities, 

Who ever swarm on Man, except in need, 

He too*must ov/n to that Eepentance^ sLiiig ; 

Endure the throes of grief, and face the toil, 

Which that undoing by the Flood entailed. 

But verily, I tell thee Tristian! 

The readiest way, to make a caitiff- wretch, 

Is, to denounce on Man, that he is one. 

How in the new, the old was rectltied 

Shall be the burden of my next, when tliou 

To thv rciieneration shalt be Avont. 



42 MAN, 



CA.lSrTO IV. 



CONTENTS. 

Tlie Deluge ; Balbcl ; Noali's Curse and tlie South ; Mount Sinai and 
Legislation to-day ; God and the Slaughter of the Egyptians ; 
Miracles ; Character of Moses : his Motive for writing the Gen- 
esis ; The Serpent's Origin ; The Fate of the Jews. 

How, forced to tread tlie world's perverted way, 

That baleful tree its blasting shadow cast 

On Tristian, as he beneath it passed j 

How feller than a frost it shrivelled up 

His bloom of youth, his earliest manhood's fruit, 

And to the grave had darked his blasted life, 

But for that saving spirit, ever blest ! 

Thou Eeader, also mated in that doom, 

Hast with that essence conned, which shall remain 

When thou by earth art stript of what she loaned, 

For wear through, life. There lies in Scathiug's nut 

A hidden kernel, which more sweetness yields 

Than bitterness its shell. It is, O Man ! 

That thou convert its harm to benefit. * 

As he had erst in tender childhood vowed, 

When first that Shadow, fell it should be raised f 

80 that achieved, he now in manhood's strength 

Kesolved, that by the Spirit's quickening lore, 

He would revi^•e, what it had quelled in him : 

That sleepless, first, he would investigate 

How far that primal Falsehood had encroached . 

Upon mankind : no more that Paradise, 

The Truth it wrecked, he studied to regain 5 

And this resolve he more determined fixed. 

Than those bold divers for a chest of gold, 

In Ocean's depth, abandoned long ago. 

With him, the will and readiness were yoked. 

And with such bated breath, as he, whose life 

Flows from his Avound, awaits the binding up, 

oS'ow eager Tristian his Mentor willed. 

The Spirit was alert unto his bid, 

And thus resumed as he had broken oft": 

'' As in my first, I shall not spare the book, 



MAF, 43 

For Truth is older and more revereut, 

While novel Error through all ages blooms. 

The Lord's success in liis correcting tlood 

Perceive in his own estimation, when 

He after acquiesced, that from his youtii 

Man was no better than he ought to be, 

For, verily, remember, Tristian, 

When all the stars, this earth, the^sun and moon 

Are blended, then is Evil merged in Good : 

What other sequel could the Lord expect ? 

The youngest Scion i'rom old Noah's loins 

Could have apprized him, as he saw^ aboard. 

For seed, a pair of all corrupted flesh 

Destruction doomed, that he might spare his flood, 

Since all those couples would beget their kind, 

As like to them, as he was to himself. 

With such results, no wonder he avouched. 

That thence, he'd let alone what once he made, 

And leave the cursing to that other mouth. 

Yea, Tree of knowledge, thou of Ignorance ! 

Had but that couple, with a little tact, 

Accosted pat the Lord in Paradise, 

When sweet in humor, for a savor smelt. 

As he was then, he would deigned to treat ; 

Would have forgiven ; would have let them stay, 

And merry making were throughout the world ! 

Yet in that covenant, he put his head 

Too much upon his heart : the sovereign, 

Who with his subjects treats on equal terms, 

To that extent, divests himself of rule, 

AVhich in the subjects' hands turns to abuse. 

The curse, the Lord eschewed, ere yet it sought 

Its proper hell, a while defiled Man's mouth. 

And though at vast declension from that Lord's 

We ken, as most disastrous next, that one 

By Noah 'gainst neglectful Ham denounced : 

Four thousand years, like comet, never known. 

Had it forth wandered, whence it had been feigned. 

And in the book its name had been ignored, 

When, in her Eden ignorance, that South 

lievived it as a charter for her wrong. 

Despite this Age's protestation, that 

Humanity was then annulling it : 

Where Reason stroked in vain, fell War has struck, 

And now herself is blasted by the curse 

Of ignorance, and by the very race 

It had been quickened 'gainst ! That Babel pil^ 

Remembers Man, that he no longer needs 

That dire conviction, by a ruthless Czar, 

Ere he be conscious, that not Heaven fi^e(| 



44 MAJSr, 

A limit for bis aim. however higli. 

And now mankind, thonftli infinitr- in loii;^ues, 

Eacli other more, and Ifeavon understand, 

Tlian when they Jind been Mded :is of one. 

As then, so novr, whene-er a nation grows 

In bulk too pT)Ss, and still her spirit wanes. 

She needs must break and part, the while, one near, 

In spirit p'Owin,a-, from her ruins rears, 

Or, if herselfs dismembered, nniOes. 

That liapless Hapsbur^- house exemplilles, 

That Craft, no longer, by dividiu^- rules, 

For every State soon to its sorrow linds 

That blasts of war, sprang- in a neighboring- land, 

(lain strength when sweeping through a varying house 

Thou art too long on eartli to be ai)prized, 

Hovv' tliey oft flourish best, who outward hold 

More sign and i)romise than they yield within ; 

Thus oft thou in the Chapters' headings kenst 

How wrenched the book's own text, that, unawares, 

Conviction drop into the thought-bare mind : 

They, Who thus tamper, call it pious fraud, 

As if God ever could be served with lies ! 

But make no quest, belike, their Lord may be : 

Its coming progeny ken from that first, 

Where in'the syllabus 'tis given out,' 

That Abram with a promised Christ wa::^ blest. 

Not ominous that pending curse has proved ; 

But direful fell that promise to the Seed. 

That as a nation it should be made great ; 

Mark this, as 'twere an acorn in the ground. 

Yea, Times of time ! Will ye return no more, 

When Man coidd haggle with the Lord himself, 

And yerk him on to his own righteousness ? 

When he would deign, as 'twere no grace at all, 

bo Man but owned him his particular god, 

To close and open wombs, as he'd beseech ; 

Ay, task himself, to get for him an heir; 

Would add a syllable unto his name, 

And even change his own, for sound divine ! 

Nor yet disdain to interpose himself 

Between Man's falsehoods and iheir consequence I 

Then, gratis would he grant his covenants, 

And, if Man doubted their fnihllment, vouch 

AVith goat and pigeon, ram and turtledove ! 

Ye favored pristine Times ! how ye contrast 

With these degenerate days, when stinted Man 

Can only know, ye were supremely blest, 

To have joossessed, of true believers all, 

That model most divine, whom he, alas ! 

Can hope to follow never, never more ! 



^laii, from tbat PropLt^t, irom a Imiidred iiior^, 

The book lias sauctified, talce tliou the cue. 

That deeds take not their standard from themselves, 

Bat as they have been praised, or damned in Writ, 

Where doer stamps tlie deed, and not the deed 

The doer, for no lying' spirit yet. 

Who owns a name, did e°er so nimbly \ aalt 

From troth to falseliood, oiid then back ag'ain. 

As did that Prophet, vdien in craven heart, 

He owned as sister, to that Pharaoh, 

His wife, and then, despite the miUl rebuke, 

The trick repeated on Abimelech. 

Yea, Tristian, there is the stress of need, 

Its very sting, that Man at last will call 

The tree by what it bears, and not the fruit 

From tree : have it the Lord's or DeviPs name. 

The need cries out, that Man at last will pore 

Within himself, and cease to stare upon 

What is paraded to his vision, by 

A childish Age. that fabled 'gainst the Trnth. 

From what the Past has handed down to Man, 

Let him, with judgment, cull what tits him best, 

But never let him sacrifice to it. 

For it were worse, than stuffing in tire dead. 

The nourishment, demanded, by the quick : 

Fond Man, if ever thou wast melancholy, 

Because not with that Jacob's ladder blest, 

Consider hovv- conditionally he 

Avowed his faith, when from his dream he woke ! 

Then question how much his God-Knowledge was 

More than thy own, ay, whether 'twas as great? 

Where Man tias been portrayed, as merely Man, 

The book is written with immortal pen, 

And no parts of it can more edify 

Than its descriptions of domestic life. 

Including those profane and i)ions cheats, 

That are vernacular to the chosen Seed, 

And never lacking in the other Man. 

What marvel that they multiplied so last 

In Egypt, when their dames the blessing took. 

As quick as tinder takes the spark from flint ? 

And, when they failed, would on their husbands urge 

To deem their maids, as what themselves had been '? 

When wives held barrenness their worst reproach. 

And where themselves tixed their alternative. 

To either found a life or lose their own .' 

Not even in these cultivated times 

Are rare such self-denying souls in wives, 

And yet, how many dames, who pious mourn 

Those days divinely blest, are too refined. 



46 MAy, 

The wLile tlieii linsbauds toil, to task themselves. 

As thrifty Leah with her mandrakes did, 

And win their spouses, coming home at eve, 

Though God, no doubt, would hearken, now as then ? 

Yea, Tristian, that field prolific teems, 

Where there is dropped in every hill a corn. 

We, in the book, have now approached that turn. 

Where we diverge from the traditional 

To the cotemporaneous path of Man 

Which with unaltered gait we'll still pursue : 

The Lord, for introductory, then changed 

Or added to his names ; it recks not which : 

Jehovah now's his proper with the Seed, 

And God Almighty is in vogue again. 

For, as from first, so 'twill forever last, 

As here on earth, so in the spheres beyond. 

How changed the Lord, or added to himself, 

His deeds, not names, shall sound as we proceed. 

As erst, the Protean aptness of the snake 

In Eden felled, so now it edifies 

In Egypt, where forgetful of that curse. 

It, rod-sired, makes its mess of its own kind. 

Instead of dust : yea, these be miracles ! 

But Tristian, as thou doest hope to go 

Where naught but truth is known, f vouch to thee, 

The miracles and mysteries of Man 

All end in laughter, but the Wonderful 

In God's Creation lasts an endless Truth. 

Yet IgTorance wiil ever cast afar. 

To force a miracle, whilst Man needs not 

To even look upon the universe, 

But only on himself, for miracle, 

Far greater than he ever can conceive. 

Yet thou wilt needs admit, that Moses then 

Himself acquitted like a master true, 

And, Vv^hether he the modern Craft in aught 

Could have instructed, or have learned from it, 

We'll not encroach, where 'tis peculiar. 

Thou knowst, how patiently and sore he strove 

With Pharaoh's ungodly sorcerers. 

And how the Lord, as patron of those friends, 

From whom Distress aye prays deliverance. 

Would harden still that heart, not soft before, 

To stay those miracles from takilig root. 

AVhen all, what Moses either of himself. 

Or by the Lord's direction, could achieve. 

Would naught avail, then did the Lord, at last 

Lay had on work himself, and, how he forced, 

That scrupulous syllabus is shamed to own : 

In proper person, Egypt's land throughout, 



^MAJS-. 47 

In tlie security of midniglit-stealtli, . 

From throne to dungeon, lie tlie first-born smote ! 

Yea '^ Smote's the designation by the book, 

But there's a verb from the Arabian 

Derived, which is the proper for the deed : 

Still be he known to us, as but the Lord ! 

There lack not, in the Craft's perverted Cant, 

They who, '' impute this to his righteousnes '^ ! 

But let Humanity still cry : '\ Great God, 

What horrors are commited in thy name ! 

Since this was perpetrated by the Lord. 

But, verily, there are yet some of Man, 

Who hold, that next the very act ot* crime, 

Is the enormity of charging it 

Upon the innocent : Account it, Man ! 

To whomsoever thou mayst choose: Has God 

Offended so, in calling thee to life, 

That this report of Him, should live in thee ? 

His crime lends wings unto the fugitive, 

And thus the chosen seed, with all their spoils 

Of borrowed jewels which they had embezzled. 

Unto the Eed-Sea passage hurried fast, 

As could the fear of swift pursuit impel. 

That miracle, but measured late of Man 

By miles and fathoms^ now does wax and wave, 

As it were with that Sea's own tide and ebb ,• 

The while lay buried in oblivion, 

Far deeper than its sand, that marvel which 

The present Age, repeating, realized : 

And yet, it is obtruded on mandkind, 

That, in this noon of knowledge, they should take, 

As miracles and mysteries, what then. 

Three thousand years ago, the chosen Seed, 

In their rude ignorance, could not digest, 

As their loud murmurs, ceaseless rcstiveness 

And numerous apostasies evince. 

Yea, scarce were they from the Egyptians ^scaped, 

And had beheld their Prophet with the Lord, 

Ere they professed, it was that golden calf, 

And not the Lord, who did conduct their flight ! 

We now approach, with rev'reuce for the Man, 

That Sinai Mount, whence he brought forth his laws : 

Thou iieedst not be an aerouaut, to know. 

How far from earth, the Lord had donned that cloud ; 

The smoke thou knowst was heaved up from below." 

'* Alas ! when Deity visits Man on earth. 

He ever comes, or leaves him, in a cloud ! 

Yet Spirit, I, with awe and reverence. 

Am present with thee, as the Prophet gives 

What Inspiration graved upon the Stones, 



48 • MAK. 

But stand, abashed with sliame, as I reflect 

The base decline from sacred Sinai Monnt 

To yonder soul offending, sorry mart, 

Where legislation now, as once a year, 

Is, in the overt, bartered, bought and sold ; 

Where tickled Hell, outright, with laughter mocks 

The fond delusion, that she is subdued : 

See how, to blind their duped constituents, 

There humbly creep, in caterpillar slough. 

They, who in summer flit the country through. 

Its butterflies ! See still another band, 

Like, serpents knotted, lurk before that mart. 

Apportioning the poison through the tongue ! 

Thou Spirit deign'dst, to hint upon that curse. 

Which, sterile from its source, was made to bear : 

Lo ! how its bliglit this land has blasted, see 

In its abandonment to such as these ! 

Yea, Spirit, next to France, which even now, 

Between her frenzy and her wreck does crush 

The heart of Man, no land so doomed as this ! 

Yea, this, the most deplorable of all. 

Since its redemption is the furthest off: 

As thou from me, wouldst thou too rjiise its curse 

Of Ignorance, the kindred to my Fall, 

Thou'dst give a boon, now sought in vain of Man I" 

"Fond Tristian, be conscious I abide 

AVith thee alone, not them j yet, when 'tis meet, 

I'll more of this. Meanwhile owns not that land 

A clergy richly fee'd, to tend this lield ? " 

^'' Alas, they tarry in that temple still 

Amongst those changers, throwing down their tills, 

And glorying o'er the fall of Babylon : 

They never stumble on a wickedness, 

That lies beyond their fire-aud brimstone-scent, 

For they are, by their discipline, enjoined 

From knowing more, than that Apostle knew.'- 

^' Then were it meet, they knew what needs their time, 

As well as he did his. That cause is lost. 

Which craves its saving from an Age defunct. 

That had enough in caring for itself. 

It* they sec not, that Baby Ions arise. 

And fall each tlay, then it were time, that Man 

Sought other eyes, to spy where Evil worms 

Into the founded Good. But to the book : 

IS"ot Aaron was the flrst, and never, Man ! 

Shall live the last of them, who nimbly float 

To oflice on the tide, how short its heave, 

And on no better subterfuge than his, 

Who cast in gold, and then came out his calf ! 

But had not kinship then, and policy 



MAN. ' 49 

Outcried tlie blame, he would have heen, instead, 

The Prophet's second, of those victims first, 

From whom the Sons of Levi, with those arms 

Served by the tenth of all, that fountain struck, 

Whose hell-shored channel, overflowing fed 

From nations', parents' children's, spouses' blood. 

Which in our course of Man we'll often cross. 

Thou'lt deem, the Prophet would more godly shine. 

Had he still forced the chosen Seed to drink 

Their gold-idolatry, and not dispatched 

Three thousand souls unto the living God, 

To find He is no calf, but know, O Man ! 

This was a consecration to the Lord : 

Faith is so precious, human life so cheap ! 

This very day yet, histories lament 

The Prophet did not then exterminate 

The old inhabitants of Palestine, 

And thus preserve the purity of faith ! 

Yea, Ignorance will smile, whenn Kowledge weeps ! 

That 'gainst Delusion and Cupidity, 

That armory of hell is closed at last, 

Man, thank Intelligence, but never, Creed. 

As shocks the Prophet's deed, so cheer his words : 

'' Love thou thy neighbor, as thou lov'st thyself," 

And " Do not gather of the harvest all, 

But leave the gleaning of it to the poor '^ 

As we proceed, we are accosted by 

A miracle, though not so dubbed by Man : 

It is that goat, from which that Lamb has sprung; 

But only simulated is that load. 

Which can be shitted on another's back. 

And though, both long are gone with what they bore, 

Yet Man's iniquities remain with Man. 

Had he to make account for sins, as then, 

When by the Lord that gatherer of sticks 

Was ordered to be stoned forthwith to death, 

Of all that multitude who daily pray : 

'• O Lord, come on the earth, and dwell with us !" 

If, once for all, their hope were realized, 

How few, that would not pray him ofl:' again ! 

Y'^ea, oft is Man's fruition but the bridge 

Between his feigned desire and sure disgust.— 

Still be thou patient, for, whilst Avith the book 

W^e must abide its miracles : they stand, 

Like mountebanks, so long as Ignorance 

Will stare on them, and this in turn will last, 

Coeval with Intelligence, else Man 

Would have no choice, and then he were a slave. 

Y^et we'll, for old acquaintance' sake, accost 

That brassy serpent, which in Edom then 



50 MAN, 

Gave life to Man, as erst that brazen one 

In Eden wrought his death, and, since it were 

Xo praise to us, to sound these miracles, 

We bid farewell to them in this, our last : 

Though Moses lets the Lord make days and nights. 

Before the sun, the moon and stars were made. 

Yet, when once fixed, he tampers there no more, 

For he was such, that not the seventy, 

To whom he feigned his spirit portioned out. 

One Moses altogether made, when, plump ! 

His imitator caricature wrought : 

For, Joshua, not contented that the Lord, 

Had furnished, from his own, the brains he lacked, 

By acting Chief of staff, and Engineer ; 

That he, with hail, discomfitted the foe, 

Much more than did the blows of Israel, 

But he must needs disturb the universe 5 

Affront the Sun and Moon, by begging them 

To help him eke his patched up geueralship. 

iSot this, but wonder is, that still it grows ; 

That, at this day, a journal, boasting of 

Its readers by the hundred thousand, them 

Can stultify with the assertion, that 

Then Joshua, not only Sun and Moon, 

But all the planetary System staid ! 

Yea, verily, there will be, for all time. 

Such fools, as never cau that Angel know. 

Though by that ass so readily recognized; 

I^or yet be able to confess in speech 

As did that brute, what they within them feel. 

Howbeit, Sun and Moon partook the brunt, 

Wherein the Lord — it being human war, 

And he but trained against those Legions, and 

Then two to one — himself were tyro proved. 

Thou'lt say, 'tis strange, but then— what is not strange '? 

That Chaos, so colossal and grotesque, 

Was improvised, to gain a strip of laud, 

Not larger than the least of modern states : 

Was't not the Promised Land, and when his word 

Has once been past, what will the Lord not do ? 

Yea, in his own good way, and Avho so bold. 

As to suggest' to him^ Thou'lt say, there is 

Xo reason in such feats : ay, if there were, 

They had not been the Lord's, and Man for him 

Has sacrificed his reason long ago. 

Thus waged the Lord his warfiire for his saints, 

Who, not ungrateful, fought again for him ; 

Yet there are some, but then they lack that grace. 

Who deem that God and Man both better fare, 

Since each fights only for his proper cause. 



MAN. 51 

From all iutelligenee, Man sacriliced 

To keep himself in savor with the Lord, 

He has at last regained the consciousness, 

That God will never strive with mortal Man. 

Ent let ns quit these wars and massacres 

To them, whose souls are nourished by their dast, 

Which is to thee as l)alefal as the steneh 

Of region, by an epidemic scourged. 

The leakier party, stiil for aye, as then 

Is ever buoyed up by the bulkier lie, 

And never cause in court the better shows, 

For the assertion, that the judge is known 

To be the owner's friend. Deplore not, Man, 

That thou art sundered from our Spirit world : 

III starred'S the progeuy, when heaven's sons 

Commingle with earth's daughters : See thyself. 

The offspring. Manaoh's wife by angel got, 

Of strength, of sight bereft, a suicide ; 

The woes, and ending of another one. 

Begot from heaven, and by woman born, 

Shall be our after theme. Therefore,- O Man ! 

Let still the heavenly with the heavenly mate, 

And earthly with the earthly be content. 

If Man will level heaven with the earth 

Let him ascend, not drag the angels down ; 

For when the crystal dewdrop blends with dust, 

The issue is but dirt. Alas ! there be 

So many, that, their number none can tell. 

Who, in their youth perverted, shame the boons 

Grod through Civilization gave to Man, 

By sorrowing in their warped, deluded souls. 

That they, instead of now, came not on earth 

Three thousand years ago, amongst this Seed 

Of Abraham : a people, whom the Writ, 

Which, sprung from priesthood, most for priesthood 

flowed. 
And holy is, because 'tis holy caUed, 
Makes the elect of God j to whom He spoke. 
From mouth to mouth, who knew Him face to face ! 
Let such compare themselves, this living age 
Unto that people, and that envied time. 
When there were such abominations rife. 
As that, which David made a gift to Soul. '^ 
" Though, Spirit, as thou sayst, that host be vast, 
Yet they're fast yielding to that waxing one, 
Whe're like those guests, that at the festive board. 
Loth, to seem odd, will with the humor chant ; 
Though lacking inclination, text and tune. 
They with the chorus but the burden drawl, 
Wnilst, still within, his lay that minstrel trills,, 



52 MA N". 

That our Creator must be felt, not feigned. '' 

*^ Yea, verily, and did the freeAst call 

That Phrygian goddess, niotlier ; were his scali> 

Her scarlet cap, he is in soul but shave, 

As e'er in market overt has been sold, 

Who cowers from the freedom of his thoughts, 

And, on the Good suspended, hangs between 

The hope of heaven, and the fear of hell ; 

Whilst only he is free, tliongli at his birth 

Chains clanged his thrall, who, by his manhood's bent, 

Inclines to honesty, and from the wrong. 

And feigns no bourn, where God Himself fixed none. 

Let them, who mourn the lapse of priesthood-rule, 

Consider whether they — whose intellect 

Is so perverted, that they aye assert. 

This earth,, as to that Adversary lost. 

And yet, dare claim its rule, by right divine, 

As theirs — could ever rule, in love, that earth, 

Which they so utterly abominate 1 

If Man will revel in that temple built 

By Solomon, and praise his splendid reign, 

Let him too mark the shadow cast on bodi. 

By those exactions, which their cost entailed : 

That heavy load so on the people ground. 

That, rather than succumb, ten tribes withdrew, 

And proved how Heaven governed they had been, 

When, with his temple, they gave up their Lord, 

And fell again before the golden calf. 

Beside that temple, place St. Peter's church, 

W^ith those exactions, these indulgences ; 

With that secession of ten tribes from twelve. 

The falling oft' from Pome of nearly halt 

Of Christendom ; then further recollect, 

For every one, who for that temple paid. 

There were full thirty for that Church at Pome : 

Thus shalt thou know that people's inner life. 

And whether thou shouldst envy their estate, 

Or they thy own. But oh, the wisdom of 

That Solomon, which heaven deigned to-give. 

As even he had prayed ! Be undeceived : 

God never makes a second gift to Man ; 

That what he has, He for his culture gave, 

And will, by that, call on him to account. 

Yea, Solomon has been so rarely wise. 

And with the Lord, so favored, intimate, 

He turned from him into idolatry ! 

The learned commentators of the book, 

Of greater and of minor Prophets write : 

Where all profess to speak the Avord of God, 

Why one is mouth-i^iecemore, another less, 



MAlSr. i 

Let those who class them so, not me, exphiiii. 

Tliou knowst that Prophet, as derived, denotes 

One who speaks for another, that is, God, 

And, that confounded with this sense has been, 

That of Predicter ; how, in this .last sense, 

Their words are made the never less'ning store, 

Wherefrom to stuff, what else were hollow shell, 

They, who besot with esoterics know ; 

For still the Khedive's vassal to tlie Turk ! 

But who cannot foist sense, on what themselves 

Have written, never will discover how 

That *' Mene, Mene, Tekel, Upharsin " 

( /ould be interpretted by Daniel. 

Let Scholiasts blazon as sublime such Writ, 

As : '' God made darkness be his secret place. 

And his pavilion round about him were. 

Dark waters and the thick clouds of the sky. " 

Such for the Lord's abode may answer well. 

But never, Tristian, for His, from whom 

That violet breathes, and yonder sun emits. 

And, more than all, whose moral government, 

In operation is as evident. 

As punctual, and as immutable. 

As are the revolutions of His spheres. 

Yet there's immortal poetry in the book, 

And if, with understanding, thou construe. 

Disjoining there, and joining this to that — 

As, by a letter's change from hard to soft, 

Thou'lt bound from bathos' depth to pathos' height— 

Thou'lt glean a harvest, which shall compensate 

That sorrow somewhat, thou tookst from the book. 

As we take leave from that old Testament, 

To vouch us ready welcome to the new. 

We'll carry with us the remembrance of 

Elijah, who, upon an only meal 

Abided forty days in Horeb's Mount, 

And then to heaven in a whirlwind went ; 

Of his Elisha, Avho conception vouched 

Unto that lacking, hapless Shumammite, 

And, since not heaven would gainsay the youth, 

Made then his promise good, and afterwards. 

With his own, life ins])iring Prophet-breath, 

Revivified the child. Remember too, 

How he, with twenty loaves, those hundred men 

Fed to satiety, and had to spare ; 

x^nd how those dry bones, by that Son of Man, 

Ezekiel's prophesying, were revived, 

And as an army stood. We to the book 

Shall bid farewell : It opens with Man's Fall, 

And closes with a dire, earth smiting curse : 



U MAN, 

Still it is lioly, for 'tis holy called ! 

2;s'ow, from his work, will to the Author tiiru : 

As thou in chiklliootl with those shepherds whil'dst, 

80 now, with me, at side of Moses sit, 

As in that Mountain he tends Jethro's flock ; 

Not there his care : he broods upon himself, 

And them, who from their ancestors, as guests, 

Were now deteriorated into serfs, 

The han of extirpation over them : 

A lamentable strait for host and guest, 

When, for security, the former yearns 

To have him out, whom he has bidden in ; 

Himself, through woman's love, by accident 

Was rescued in the prelude of that doom. 

Whose earnest might at any moment fall. 

He had been educated at the court, 

Learnt all what Egypt then, that eldest school 

Of present Man, could teach the human mind ; 

Preferred in his own person, he yet felt, 

In sympathy, more keen his people's woe, 

Than they, its victims ; last, in noble heart, 

He slays the haughty, who did smite the poor. 

Already overwretched in his doom ) 

Rebuked, denounced by them he championed. 

He sacrificed position, favors, all. 

And now, an outlaw, he is tending sheep ! 

There have been patriots, will be again. 

But, first in head, and heart, that Moses stands : 

Not more upon the tree direct the limbs 

Unto the trunk, than to his soul the thoughts 

To free his people, and to make them great. 

For this he worried till he could outdo 

Th' Egyptians in the arts he learnt of tbcm ; 

For this he tasked his ingenuity. 

Till his imagination bare that name. 

Which vibrates 'tween the traits of God and Man ; 

For this he pieced Tradition's Time-gnawn thread, 

And, when that failed, from his rich fancy spun, 

To weave that Genesis, wherein to fold 

His people to a Nation's unity ; 

For this, as their Exodus' stimulant, 

He feigned that Paradise lay thereabout. 

Where they would find the flow of Promised Land, 

And, conscious that his race' vernacular 

Was parleying of precious stuff, gave out. 

That there, with many gems, the gold was good ! 

Yea, gold in heavenly Paradise fits well ! 

My human friend, engrave it on thy soul, 

That Knowledge too can smile, whilst Ignorance 

Bewails her doom : To win bis people from 



MA If. 55 

Th' Egyptian deities, lie feigned their first, 

Yea, their Creator of the universe, 

The Serpent, to have been that Adversary, 

Who in his Eden wrought that Fall of Man ! 

He reason then did have, to feign it such : 

What now is Man's, that he should credit still, 

Save, having bidden Eeason once good-by, 

He needs must wander from it, evermore ! 

Thou, Tristian now needst scarcely to be told. 

His deluge was suggested by those shells, 

Which he on Horeb, as thyself hast found 

Upon thy native mounts : thou kuow'st from school, 

That if, instead of forty, it should rain 

Four hundred days, it could not flood this globe : 

Yet then he feigned the best account he could ; 

The miracles, he fabled done by him, 

He wrote for after generations' use : 

How Creeds, to-day, yet snatch the bait, thou kuow'st ; 

Man reckons not, that Time, forgetting him, 

Repairs his slight, that would ignore his Age. 

Yea, heed the crying Kow, not echoing Past : 

The stream, from which thou, thirsting, yesterday 

Hast drawn thy very life, to-day may prove 

Thy death, by drowning ; so Mose' voucher to 

Those feeble tribes, they were of God elect. 

To hearten them on to the goal he fixed. 

Soon, in their overweening, proved their bane, 

For they were never as a nation great, 

But often tributary to those foes. 

They could but envy, never emulate ; 

And, that their country never bloomed like rose, 

Was cared for by that primal curse on toil. 

Which still the chosen Seed from instinct dread. 

Although Humanity may palliate, 

'Twill not ignore, that Moses' slaught'ring, by 

His sworded priests, of those three thousand doomed; 

As to that Egypt's horror, it has stood. 

From first, and will to last, no people e'ci- 

Can flourish through assassination's blood : 

Their subjugations and captivities 

Evince, that God's sure justice visits it. 

And if commited by the Lord himself. 



56 MAN. 



CA.NTO V 



CONTENTS. 

The aucient Gcutiie World: Ef^ypt, Greece and Kome. Homer, Zor- 
oaster, Confucius, Socrates, Alexander, Hannibal, Marius, Sylla, 
Cncsar. The Vicissitudes of Nations. 

As, aitherward, the lark rejoiciug scales, 

When Spring's lirst sun lias cheered her on her wiugs ; 

Yea, like the eagle rockiug 'bove the clouds, 

To recreate within her element ; 

So braced in bent, the breast of Tristian, 

Elated by the lore, the Spirit taught, 

For knowledge, strenuously, higher strove, 

Above the transient littleness of Man 5 

And though his heart, as wont, its welcome gave 

To friend or stranger, ere the greet was spoke. 

He rather shunned, than sought to be with Man ; 

For now his conversation palled his sense. 

As mere tongue-practice on the sated ear. 

And, though hiLQself would fain have made his speech 

The carrier from own to stranger breast. 

He checked himself, and left his w^ords but blank. 

For he had felt, how sore it irks the soul. 

When she lets out, what clamors most within, 

And wakes no echo ; when the shrinking heart 

Eeproves us for another's chilling gaze. 

To which, too forward, we had laid it bare. 

Yea, vain it is for Man, to cast beyond 

For that communion, which he, at last, 

Can find but in himself. Thus, Tristian weaned 

From all what sounding comes, and hollow leaves, 

Was, through the Spirit, wedded fast to Man 

By but those ties, Eternity has spun. 

As maiden, in the prime of love, desires, 

So now, he for the absent Spirit yearned, 

NVho, true familiar, made his presence felt, 

Ere he to Tristian thus announced himself: 

" Acquainted with that chosen Seed, 'tis meet, 

That now thou learn, how fared the lordless world : 



MAN. 57 

If, those elastic aud patlietic souls, 

Who ever volunteer, to answer all, 

Save what is sought, thou at this start shouldst ask. 

Which were the happier, Gentile, or Elect ? 

They would apprize thee with complacency, 

That there's no difficult}^ in the case, 

Like those apt judges, whose decisions are, 

Invariabl}, on appeal reversed ; 

And then, they'd turn on thee tbeir unctuous flow, 

Till thou wouldst gladly take thy leave again. 

Yea, verily, the Hebnnvs had been blest 

If but, as twilight to the noontide shows, 

Their Palestine's reality compared 

Unto that fancy, which still vaunts itsi^raise." 

*' Its iteration's fulsome through the world ; 

For as in monarchies, by Oratt of rule. 

So in republics, through Stupidity, 

The bias for that book is dinned to Man, 

And all, because it has been holy dubbed, 

Whereby, the soul is stinted, warped and crushed : 

By heavens, Spirit ! as bewildered ott, 

I straid within that parasitic lore, 

Which has so rankly round that fable sprung. 

There ever was a Prompter in luy breast ; 

Yea, 'twas the very voice of God Himself, • 

Which warned me, that the Deity, I felt, 

Had not created this vast universe, 

For but a little strip, that scarce deserves 

The name of country ; that He never had 

A thousand million children, then on earth. 

To be a father to but barely hve. 

But Spirit, since I am restored 1)y thee 

To my estate, more, than yet ever heir. 

When reinstated to his ousted rights, 

I shall insist, for my immortal soul, 

That Falsehood, to a tittle, shall restore 

The lasting Truth, of which I have been wronged." 

" That thou shall have it, is vouchsafed by me. 

But yet, thou shouldst have been upon thy guard ; 

For, as Man now, so has he ever been : 

Thy every day Experience bade thee judge 

Of men, by their report, and to beware 

From taking them, as what they boast themselves. 

Hast thou from its cotemporaries heard, 

That they accredited that chosen Seed 

To have been such, as it asserts itself? 

Yea, is it not, in its vicissitudes. 

All overweening children's counterpart ^ 

Mark, 'tis the prelude to a nation's fall, 

When, in delusion of her excellence, 



5S MAN. 

She will presume, that with impunity, 

She can transgress on Heaven's order, and 

Exact from Man more than her merits earned. 

Let nations be exclusive, as they will, 

And raise, themselves, what needs for body, and 

3^or mind, but let them still import their praise : 

That of domestic growth is vicious stuif. 

Thou knowst, this world is from eternity. 

And that to Man, at large, is but a name. 

Whilst big with sense to us. Now cast in thought : 

Although, thy life to everlasting time 

Compares but little more, than naught to all. 

Yet, long, or short, 'tis of that Avhole a part. 

If that eternity, which has elapsed. 

Thou wilt consult, with withered memory, 

Oblivious, it mumbles what occurred 

Eour thousand years ago, yet contradicts, 

In second breath, what in the first thou heardst, 

Till, coming down, it from the records speaks. 

With which the contradictions still increase, 

Though, gradually, verging from the main 

Into details, as they this centre near. 

Eut thou, of that eteruit^^, which lies 

Ahead of thee, canst know no more, than if 

Thou never hadst been born, save only, what 

Thou'lt from the present cast. Why this is so. 

Thou Shalt hereafter learn. If thou canst decjii. 

That there is naught, in spirit, or in stuff, 

Of natural, or seeming monstrous cast ; 

Yea, more than Man can feign, can ever dream, 

But has already been, or will be yet, 

Thou'lt have an inkling of eternity. 

'From this deduce, that Wisdom understands, 

Wheiie Ignorance contemns, and then thou'lt know, 

How 'tis, that Man, in meaner things, than he 

Beholds himself, will feign to worship God ; 

How now, in Egypt, by the name of Kneph. 

The Serpent, in reality, is owned, 

As of its deities, the ^ery first, 

Wliiist it is feigned, in Eden, to ha\ e ])een 

The ruiijous, suggestiug foe of Man. 

Tliou marvelst, how tliy God permits himself. 

To 1)8 confounded v.ith such abject things .* 

Is it for thee, or Him, to say, how He 

Shall be adored oF Man ; One reason holds, 

Wh3' Time should fiee in minutes, and abide. 

For everlasting, in Eternity, 

And why the Sculptor shaped that x\pis-god. 

Whom, in one stroke, he could undo again, 

Whilst I now teacli to thee the lore of truth, 




MAK. 59 

Which, like a circle, ends where it begau. 

Thou understandst, why thou cam'st on this earth 

An animated blank, instead the fill 

Thou hast attained ; thou readily wilt perceive, 

The tender sprout, that needs the tepid air, 

Would by the July-sun be singed, and die ; 

And yet, thou marveldst why, in childhood then, 

Thy kind has lacked the noon's enlightenment, 

Wherein, its manhood-intellect now basks ; 

Where Child no play, the Man no earnest, Irnows : 

80 had that Age not built its pyramids, 

Its obelisks, and kindred marvels all. 

Which, mined, or intact, amaze mankind, 

Then could this Age not speak around the globe, 

Through bottomed" ocean, with the speed of thought. 

And, as this living Age its prodigies 

Could never have conceived, through ancient gods. 

So could Antiquity have never reared 

Her monuments, upon the modern creeds. 

Hence learn thou, that, despite its own avouch, 

Xo system for eternity endures, 

Since, in all Heaven's order first is change : 

The motion, which that Genesis forgot. 

I'd have thee, ever, close thy ear against 

A parrot phrase, first by some lack-brain taught, 

To be purveyor to all barren minds ; 

It is, that history repeats itself: 

Know, the Omnipotent has not designed 

Eternity, as finite Man constructs 

A music-instrument, which, when it played 

Its numbered melodies, nuist either cease, 

Or wound up new, by repetition pall : 

Instinctively, Man's genius will know 

Its kin originality in all ; 

AVhereas, the doctered and short-sighted soul • 

Dare look but through the glass of i)recedents. — 

Let Man of merit, as in Egypt then, 

Be, after death, revered still as a god. 

Since he of none, in life, has ever been. 

Will ever be, adored as scarcely less, 

And all for favors, which he owes to chance. 

From Man's Civilization's nursery. 

Old Egypt, we pass to its garden, Greece, 

Where planted, grafted with her i^ative slips, 

She soon excelled her fertile mother-stock. 

There, Man was blest with laws, in manner like 

The chosen Seed, and very near its time. 

Both were from heaven feigned, although alleged 

From counter gods : one from the Lord himself; 

The other, by the self asserting son 



60 MA If. 

Of Jupiter, was given unto Greece. 

But then, what profit Heaven's laws to Man, 

When hankering Evil's their custodian, 

Expositor, Executor and all ? 

Thou, fond Lycurgus, hadst thou thought of this. 

Thou never wouldst have taken thy resolve! 

Yea, governments and laws are then divine, 

When, in tlieir application, they so prove. 

Yet, whence their origin, l)nt they can tell, 

Who have not all confounded Heav'n with Hell, 

And given unto hotli the i'ornier name. 

'Tis true, on earth, there must be go\ernments, 

But till the Truth prevail, there will be few, 

Whatever be their form, to prove themselves. 

More the promoters of the good of Man, 

Than merely cunning engines for his harm, 

Contrived to take, from where 'tis justly owned, 

To there bestow, where it is not deserved. 

From demigod, we to the bard ascend : 

Still lives the God, that gave great Homer life 5 

The gods, which he created, are defunct. 

And yet, through them, the bard immortal lives : 

In Homer witness, how the fellowship 

With Deity impregnates human soul, 

And though, the offspring be no lasting god, 

Yet, she herself will be immorralized. 

Yea, thou imaginative, merry Greece ! 

Not ever Heaven, but Olympus high, 

Could have remained ; yet since thy Tartarus 

Has died out in that Hell, the latter owns 

This earth, by right of forfeit, as a fee ! 

How it was lost, Man were abashed to own 

To thee, wert thou, as in thy best estate ; 

Meanwhile, that Heaven, which thou feign'dst so near. 

Has shifted further, where, no eye has seen, 

No ear has heard, nor ever heart conceived ; 

For, even now, 'tis feigned, its foretaste here 

Would make our Heaven vapid, past the grave. 

And wiser is this age, than thine has been. 

For time but then began, when thou wast dead! — 

Yet as thou seest, in Mars' sired Jlomulus 

Whom Murder from the earth to heaven raised, 

The offsprings from Olympus shared the fate 

Of those descended elsewhere on the earth. 

To no such doom did «Zoroaster fall, 

For he, not claiming to be more than Man, 

In him no jealous foe, but pupil found. 

Prepared to follow where he showed the way, 

That brought him to the Source, whence he has sprung. 

How conscious Man accords his gratitude 



MAlSr. 61 

To that Eeformer, who will set hioi right, 

Concerning his relation with his God, 

Is witnessed l)y those children of the Snii, 

Who made the offspring of Confucius 

Their sole, hereditary, noble caste : 

Though system fall, these words shall live for aye, 

Announced through him : ^' Do not to others, w^hat 

Thou wouldsc not have, that they should do to thee.'' 

Co-infinite, with His material Avorld, 

Clod left His incorporeal for Man, 

To fill out with the offsprings of his mind, 

To whose conception, even, if it he 

Kemonst'ring of Himself, He set no bounds, 

And hence — as childhood is more edified 

With i3uppets, than with natural adults — 

Mankind in every Era's infancy 

Instinctively, because congenial, 

Accept as God, not as He really is, 

But as presented by the feigning mind ; 

Then, as the era's intellect matures^. 

Comes the philosopher, who substitutes 

As God, the Maker of god-making Man, 

Until the following Era vfipes away 

The former's gods, philosopher, and all, 

Beginning with a system of its own. 

Five centuries had interposed their change. 

Between the poet and philosopher. 

When, for denying of the bard-feigned gods, 

Who gradually then succumbed to time. 

Great Socrates was doomed to die for Truth ; 

Yet, that he did not die for Truth in vain, 

Man quickly proVed, when he came to himself. 

In punishing the causers of his death : 

But there he made an end of violence. 

'Twere well, that Man would make a note of this. — 

Thou noble Solon ! Scribes of sinecures, 

In vain, would prostitute, for modern use. 

Thy legislating for Humanity, 

Which never will forget, that it was thou 

Who bade departing Fortune go alone, 

And take along, no more, the freedom of 

The debter and his dearer duplicates. 

And that thou madest tlie law, that only they, 

Who are to sacrifice, to bleed and die. 

Should say, w^hen peace for war shouhl be exchanged : 

Despite the ruin wrought, by mass, or class. 

That country will be next perfection, where 

The dominant democracy will heed 

The aristocracy of intellect. 

Though Cant in modern times would cry it down. 



62 MAN, 

Yet, Atheus ! glorious thy praise, in that 

Tlion gav'st their culture to thy slaves so mild 

That thou and they were cursed with no revolt. 

Thou happy Greece ! where is thy like so blest, 

That for appreciative patronage, 

One to the others owned, himself was classed 

Amongst them as one of the seven wise ? 

Yet thou, in one respect, hast never been 

So singularly blest as modern times ; 

For, in thy very superfluity. 

Thou Yv ast constrained, to ostracize th> git^at, 

AYhereas, in latter dnys, the great, or they 

Who pass as such, pay of their magnitude 

Such tribute to that Sion, that their miglit 

Gives no offence unto the common tribe. 

Yet still, unrivalled Greece ! whilst for a gloss, 

All other countries but cocpiet with thee, 

There's one whose Learning with the earnestness 

Of truthful Sove thy. Spirit wooes, and lo ! 

Its potent as in thy own best of days : 

For thy own Salamis, behold Sedan ; 

l^r Marathon, the yielded fortress, Metz ; 

And tierce Plata-a in that Paris view. 

Whilst thy Thermopylre thou'lt find again 

In those dark passes, which to Belfort led.— 

\>t, to approve their Avill, there is no need, 

A people burn their shi])s, as they advance, 

For, ill retrieving what is lost, not in 

DispLtvine: what is o\\ ncd, is greatness shown ! 

Yea, Greece ! thy Spirit lied ; then fell thy arms 

Not thou to Philip ever hatlst succumbed, 

]Sor still more to liis son, had they not been 

More Greek, than thy degenerated sons : 

Behold great Alexander deviate. 

From his world conquering march, to recreate 

His hero-spirit from the scenes of him, 

Who struck his inspiration to the glow. 

Whilst, with the greatest teacher of the world. 

He only lacked that greater still, the one. 

To designate, when, in the precepts taught, 

Exception should be made ; for still his soul, 

Her own original, succumbed to lore. 

But as the lion to the tamer's eye ; 

And as, when that is turned, the spell is broke. 

And all revives, what discipline has quelled ; 

So, if his tutor's stay was once upset, 

From order into riot fell, who was 

The Age's master, and the Minute's slave : 

It recks not, what his mission was on earth, 

He broke the contract of his lease with God, 



MA JSr. 63 

Who, for ill using of His tenement, 

Ejected liim before his term. exi)ired — 

Though rarely conscious, Man yet ever feels, 

That, never failing recomijense of toil 

Lies in the joy, while undergoing it : 

When laboring, like an art, that hillward tugs 

A heavier load, than her industrious bulk, 

Great Hannibal clomb those forbidding Alps ; 

When first his soul was ravished, to behold 

The execrated Komans turn their backs; 

Again, when seventy thousand of their dead 

AVere counted to him on that Cannae's eve, 

Xot higher could he have exulted theii, 

Than if he later had at Zama proved 

Victorious, instead forever thrown. 

And yet, as afterwards he shuddered through, 

When made aware, how, sickened in estate, 

His exile did infect his former friends, 

W^ho shunned him thence, as he were pestilence, 

If he, before, had crossed a hundred Alps, 

Had won five hundred battles, and had slain 

Ten millions of them, his heart abhorred ; 

Still for his wound he had not found his cure. 

Short of that poisoned cup. Doomed Hannibal, 

Whose noble heart was broke, when in his camp, 

His brother's head was cast, in his despair, 

Could not conceive, that though the mightiest. 

That wrong mankind, repel the stranger's scourge, 

They wreak, at last, worst vengeance on themselves : 

That Kome, which Carthage ])huidered, and then burnt, 

And ousted nigh a million of their homes ; 

Which massacred the unarmed Spaniards, 

And only left the children and the aged 

Of all that Boian race ; which so oppressed 

Its vassals, that the doomed Sicilians 

Would rather in the Etna's flames be cast, 

Than to endure their brute, corrupted rule ; 

That Eome was rearing then the rack, whereon 

To stretch herself, in worse than victims' groans : 

Her public trusts had waxed so lucrative, " 

That for the vile, as for the high, tliey had 

Become a scramble by the pull of bribes, 

'Gainst which all laws but nugatory proved, 

Since shameless judges their decisions sold ! 

Yet, for a time, that Marius might slay, 

As if they were not of the human kind, 

More than a hundred thousand at a swoop 

Of those doomed Teutones, Cimbri and more tril)es : 

Full soon he raged a feller fiend in liome, 

And only yielded to a worse one still, 



Rome, 



64 iiAisr. 

When Sylla wruug the havoc from his grasp. 

Yea, Tristian, not from the hearse to grave 

The corpse more quick and sure, than offices 

From bribe to blood descend. Like bloated leech, 

That can no more, so glutted with her blood. 

That Sylla dropped of from distempered Ron 

And, as a voluntary castaway. 

At Cumie choked in his own ravened lilth, 

Yet, as no Man can altogether prove 

A devil, unredeemed, sohe evinced. 

That human nature, howsoe'er depraved. 

Must be disgusted with the hell it wrought. 

Fell Marius too, somewhat, his crimes atoned. 

In raising into Man the Proletar, 

Then but depending on the charity 

Of them, that were the pampered of the State, 

For what so be the boast of Charity, 

The sweetest bread, she yields, is only sttur. 

And, howsoever soft she spread her couch. 

The down is but on top, whilst underneath 

It is a ledge of rock. Let Charity 

Forever seek and care for Man inlirm. 

But better were that system 'mongst mankind, 

Which rendered it unneeded by the whole, 

Than that, which urges on the pampered few, 

To yield their crumbs unto the Aictim mass.— 

Along the farther bank of Rubicon, 

His trusty horse his couch, behold a Man ! 

'Tis CcTsar meditating through that night : 

What, hero! dost thou dread! Is't Pouipey's soul, 

Thy Inspiration fears the coping with ? 

Thou feelst, and hast approved thy caliber. 

And thou knowest his : which has the farther cast 

Is it the Senate's might, which bars thy on ? 

Shall jackals raven on the lion's prey f 

Or does that Imprecation daunt thee back, 

Which dooms to the infernal deities 

Rome's hostile son, who dares across the stream ? 

Lo ! the inscrii)tion on the mould'ring stone 

Is graved by human hands, a Latin slave's , 

And, who conceived it was no more than thou : 

It is by Man, who only can dispose 

Of fleeting minute, as he understands, 

But cannot bid, whence ousted is himself. 

Consider, but a few more hundred years. 

And they, for whom it simulates to speak. 

Are in the reverance of Man defunct, 

Whilst thou Shalt in his memory endure, 

So long as he shall kfiow his yesterday, 

Whilst then, yea then, that edict of the gods 



MAN. 65 

Shall ouly iu tby bold infringeineut live ! 

Still heed the God of all, wh» prompts withiu. 

Thou hast decided, aud thy legions shout 5 

With speed of thought to Ivouie ! They who eujoyod 

Their vauut before, shall after chew their wail; 

Though Fompey stamp his foot, he stamps iu vain. 

A sinking cause sends not its legions up, 

And for himself? what can his name avail 'I 

Man tiocks to Man, as birds upon a tree, 

Xot for the trunk, but for the fruit it yields : 

Great Ciesar won the prize* that ever in 

Its value is proportioned to its vStake; 

But not from hundred daggered Gicsars, Rome 

Could ever have redeemed tliat spirit, which. 

She through misdeeds, had forfeited for aye, 

For, that the nauie makes no republican, 

]More than the v>'reath would crown a sot, a bard. 

Thou knoweit too well, unless thy veiy sight 

Thou'lt own as treacherous, or tliat thou too 

Art blind, like them, who follow where they're plucked. 

Is it so rare, as 'twere a special grace. 

That after such a leugthy carnage-swoop 

Yet further stretched by those disastrous Vv'ars 

AVhich left the Empire In Augustus' hands 

When Man of blood was to his ichor drawn 

He should at last crave rest and bandage, and 

That then that universal peace set in, 

Unless Man wdl admit, the aim and end 

^Vhy he is born, and waxes to adult 

Is but, that he might slay his fellow Ma a ? 

Yet so that learned tribe insinuate 

Who fain impute that momentary lull 

To what chaiiced soon in subject Palestine 

Which at that time appeased the world as much 

As Hy on camomile the fever cools. 

Thus, through the vista of eternity 

Thou seest all nations by their spirits borne, 

As water on the main : now high by Hood 1 

And now, by ebb depressed, absorbing now 

And then in turn, in part or all absorbed 

To-day the victor, where but yesterday 

They were the victims : their vicissitudes 

But springing from themselves, and not from chance. 

No nation ever fell a day too soon 

Nor ever government, that yet collapsed, 

But its prolonging had a better barred ; 

And whde both are, there's reason they should be, 

While their destruction, in itself, aftbrds 

The reason why they should not longer last. 

That time, when wars shall cease, will never be. 



66 MAl^. 

For war's the final reason, last resort, 

:N"ot of tlie Kings, but truly of mankind. 

Instead, a demonstration of brute force, 

It is the culmination of the worth, 

A nation owns in Spirit and in Stuff ; 

And were all nations in one unified. 

Instead, of foreign, 'twere domestic war. 

'Tis only by thy age's living light 

That thou canst render legible the Past ; 

For, Man yet never understood the Past 

Who did not comprehend his proper age : 

And, whose behind his time, is up to none ; 

For as from first, so to the last endures 

Our Power to create and to undo j 

Still repetition in Man's history 

As I have taught before, thou'lt seek in vain : 

The causes of a nation's rise and fall 

Forever stay, but their events still change. 

As Man himself, beyond all others, loves, 

So it is meet, that, to the ages past 

He should prefer the one, in which he lives j 

Yet, with his censure let him still forbear, 

Since there has never been, will never be, 

Au age that cannot justify itself. 

Let still each Era boast its proper hue, 

But yet remember, that the prior one. 

Has ground the colors ready for its use : 

The Cynics' happiness in the contempt 

Of riches and the pleasures of this life, 

Is still condemned, as heathen vagary, 

AYhilst, taught by Dispensation, it is praised 

As self-denial in the Christian: 

The greatest virtue, meet for Paradise ! 

Yea, Tristiau, that dark'ning, darkened Age, 

Has poured the juice of many a precious fruit, 

That ripened with the Gentiles, in the ditch, 

Whilst it dispensed, the murk alone to those. 

Whb hankered for the change, and, all because. 

Its land and people were not holy dubbed ! 

Yet mourn not Man, that Greece and Eome are dead 

For him, wlm'se worthy of thorn, they live still. 



MAN. 67 



C^ISTTO VI. 



CONTENTS. 

The Angel's Gieetiu>^- to Mary. Christ's Blnh, Sufferino;?, Uciith, 
Resurrection and Ascension. The Apocalypse. St. Paul ; St. 
Poter and the Church. The Jovrs' Rejection of Redemption. 

Wlial needs, to prove the SouVs eternity, 

The strainnig after subtile arguments, 

When she will demonstrate it in herself ? 

There is a limit to the secular, 

And as its wonders, figured by the hand 

Of Deity, are still unrolled to Man, 

The time shall come, when he'll survey yond spheres. 

Minutely, as this, his native globe, 

Howbeit, he cannot augment their size. 

By his addition of a single foot. 

But where her bounds, the soul knows not herself, 

And, as she still creates her own domain, 

" jSTo further" \s never found by her, who can 

Dilate herself throughout the universe, 

And with eternity's co-infinite. 

What life had never been to Tristian, 

'Twas noAY, since he was with the Spirit blest : 

The prelude to his soul's eternity, 

And every minute, when of him deprived, 

He from his stock of time but deemed as filched. 

The Spirit waxing fond of Tristian, 

As he of him, his visit made unbid, 

And thus renewed the earnest conference ; 

" Thou know'st, the theologic lore declares, 

That God did owe it to the majesty 

Of him, it calls his son, to silence all 

The Jewish Prophets, for four hundred years, 

That all the nations might prepare themselves 

For him, in whom their hopes should be fulfilled. 

This obligation being fixed on him. 

What could the Lord else do, than to dispose 

His people's heart against that hankering 

For Prophets, who, of questionable sooth, 



68 MAN, 

How ever genuine in their own avoncli, 

Were tlience, decried impostors, and the like f 

Shonld he have stickled, and disowned his due. 

When, like a patron's debt, behind his hack, 

By client paid, it kindly was assumed, 

By the then conquerors of Palestine, 

Who rather (ihose their Satraps', Praetors' mouth, 

Than its own in^o]^hets' for the polity, 

Wherewith the chosen Seed were i^'overned then ? 

" Thou meanst, to open with that Testament : 

It is for them for whom that Fall still lives ; 

For me 'tis dead, but for mankind, at large, 

More infinitely blest had been its boon. 

Had it disclosed to Man, as thou to me, 

That there, in sooth, has never been a Fall, 

Instead of showing, he might barely lind 

Redemption, on the thousand devious i)aths. 

Whereon he wanders, verging from its main. 

That Dispensation, with a second Lord, 

Precipitates a third god on the world, 

But if that second from that Lord be sprung, 

I can but wish he had another sire. 

For, whether it was he, the holy ghost. 

Or was our God, thou know'st, Man asks in vain 

Of them, who yield him all, save what he seeks. 

Oh, thou omniscient Spirit, give me Truth ! 

And founded on a grain, my soul shall rear 

Her fabric, through eternity, to God ; 

For she'll be lured, no more, to enter there, 

Where all rests on the basis of a myth. 

Man starts with fabricating of our God, 

Thence, he continues falsifying with 

His fellow Man, and thus he yields himself 

Unto the very Evil he would shun : 

He ousts the conscience, God has idaced in liim, 

And, in his acts, is justified by faith ! 

Thus all directness is forever swamped, 

Till retribution follows the offense 

In own, or national calamity. *' 

'' In my illustrating, I shall proceed. 

As though to thee the fable still were dread. 

And then thou'lt open there, where now thou bar'st 

Yet be thou cautioned, not to take offense, 

And, in our progress, ere thou stumble, speak. 

That I may lift thee 'cross the obstacle. 

How that new Testament refutes the old, 

Behold in what is written by Saint John ; 

It reads : '' No Man at any time saw God. " 

In this admission, what becomes, O Man ! 

Of all those interviews, of -face to face, 



M A ^. 69 

Aud eonver.satioufc;, held from mouth to moutli, 

Related 'tween the Propliets rnid tlie Lord? 

Thou'lt say : "Tis true enouoli, they saw not God, 

But then they were inspired." Ifow doest thou know f 

Because of their assertion '? Be it so ; 

But 'tween the two, an author from his work 

(lets l)etter credit, than it can from liim. 

'Twas meet, tliat Mau, doomed in that fabled Fall, 

III fullness of his time — since, out of it, 

No leaf unfolds— should he redemption taught. 

How, in those fifteen hundred years, between 

The feiguing and redeeming of that Fall, 

The doomed compare with them, who knew it not, 

Thou in the most essential features knowst. 

But what transpired above, to save mankind. 

What consnltations were in council held. 

What plans were formed, but to be cast aside 

How the conviction, that he was constrained 

To save mankind, within the Lord still grew, 

Aud how his love of Man, at last, overcame 

His stickling at the only final price, 

Which Satan deigned, to take for Man's release. 

All this, thou better canst acquire at large. 

From those familiars in the vestibule. 

Who, though closed out, yet hold their ears so tight, 

That they can catch, whatdro])S through heaven's eaves. 

The book tells, that the Son of Man asserts. 

That he was by the Heavenly Father loved. 

Ere yet the world's foundation had been laid. 

In this there's nothing enigmatical, 

vSince now thyself knowst better, than to deem, 

That God's cousideration for mankind 

Is less than human father's, whose concern 

For his incoming offspring sure precedes 

The cradle he constructs, to place it iii. 

xVnd what so wondrous, both the Testaments 

Should speak of virgin to conceive a child f 

Unless a former Avidow be the spouse, 

Few are the fathers, that would be content, 

That their first offspring should have been conceived 

By other than a virgin. On thy brain, 

More than on ear, that name : '^' God's mother'' grates. 

But how mates she, Avho is so called on earth, 

With her, who was his his heavenly mother erst. 

Since, he God's son, before he came on onrth ? 

Ye Councils, called the ecumenical. 

For once, be not so economical. 

As but to give, vrhat ye did give beforc> : 

Declare, That God did have a spouse from first ; 

Reveal her glory and her attributes. 



70 MA If. 

Tliat, Ni^iitilly, maukind be blest oiice more. 

In knowing what tbey never knew before ! 

Then, too, assert your mission, and explore 

if John, the Baptist's kinship with the Son 

\\\as not more, than as second cousin, near. 

Let Daniel still call Gabriel a Man : 

Is't not the male, who keeps his angelshi]) 

IXuto his grave, whilst but the female with 

The cradle quits, to be angelical ? 

And since that Daniers death, was there not time 

For (labriel, to be beatified 

As one, amongst those radiant Cherubim, 

Who, though as hoary as a promontory". 

And lusty like its gulls, are never known 

Pecnliar with the cuckoo, save in wing ? 

Xor yet mistake, that Gabriel, when he 

To Zach arias, and to Mary came. 

Was of those angels of the churches, whom 

The sainted John was bidden to address. 

For such, as these, are not disposed to own 

The subtle ni.emory of Gabriel, 

Who knew familiar facts, though six months old ; 

But rather Man, behold that Messenger, 

As even in thy fancy he's conceived, 

Eemembering, that nothing is with God 

Impossible, save but absurdity, 

Which in all hues is possible with Man. 

It is the trait of heavenly ministers. 

As with domestic servants, to consort 

There* where their masters would not condescend. 

Let Man still strive, to imitate with her 

In whom, through God, he mnltiplies Ijimself, 

That Angel's courtesy, who winning wooed, 

As told, in his first chapter, by Saint Lake. 

Let Woman, too, take still example thence. 

What her obedience should yield to Man, 

For, all instructions which the angel gave 

Were most minutely carried out in proof; 

Yea even, in the naming of the child. 

His willing it should Jesus be prevailed 

Against the Prophet's pet Eoiinanuel ; 

And yet that name — though by an angel given. 

Enlarged by creed, whom it still designates — 

Has waxed as odious, as grateful still 

That Christian, the heathen Greek bestowed ! 

'Twas only in the gift of David's throne, 

Wherein the sequel from the promise sheered : 

But that was in the Eomans to bestow. 

Or rather Satan, if so Man prefers, 

Since, by the Scripture, he owns all the earth. 



MA iV^. 71 

So many times, the Moon had waxed and waned, 

Since that familiar greeting was returned, 

When Bethlehem beheld it realized. 

What would the Son of Man's astonishment 

Have been, when he beheld himself transferred 

Into a manger from his heavenly throne, 

If he himself had not picked out bis route, 

I even falter to conceive, and must 

To that Imagination relegate, 

That lets him so descend. Thou knowst too well, 

That, though the birth of Man in lowliness 

Scath not his spirit, yet confinement there 

Will stunt it to decay in barreness. 

Though Poverty be counted no disgrace, 

Yet 'tis no honor, how so be its vaunt 

A cloak for them, who feast beyond their due. 

Though low in place, his birth was high in voice, 

For, what a solitary one had pledged. 

Was by a host of angels welcome praised 
Unto those shepherds, who the tidings spread. 

Star guided gratulations also came 
From Eastward to the newborn king, 
But had their bearers from the Southward hailed. 
They either would have owned less fame, or more 
Of Its astronomy. Hereafter, ken 
What all this profitted the Sou of Man ; 
Suffice, the bruit another king was born 
Bedevilled Herod to that massacre, 
Whose horror may our God hence spare mankind. 
In sooth it was a sorry ush'ring in ; 
Yea, Tristian, when once the truth prevails, 
And every loom gets back the cloth it spun, 
The fixmg of that blame shall be revised. 
The infant bloomed, beneath his mothers care, 
Which she redoubled in a father's lack. 
What was his culture and development, 
Is indicated by his benching with 
Those temple doctors, in his twelfth of vears. 
But soon that shadow, which thou knowst too well, 
In Its dark confines lapped his swelling heart, 
And made him patient with that fellest ill : 
An aching spirit in a healthy frame. 
He sought and strained for adequate relief 
Amongst the doctors of his country's iaith, 
And Irom the Scriptures, whence themselves biid learnt, 
^ut soon discovered, that for his complaint , 
The system could altbrd no remedy, 
Unless it first were all reformed itself 5 
•And this directs us from my gross of lore 
Unto Its spirit : thou hast ivad. the Word 



72 MAN'. 

Had been made llesb, wliicli iiieans^ that then tlie flesh 

Took up the Truth, which permeates the All, 

That Man might be restored Jiis portion back, 

Which had been fabled from him by that Fall, 

And which, though once he might have spared it well, 

Was to his growth then indispeusable. 

Thou knowst, though potently the Word can rule 

In Spirit's realm, it yet was never God, 

jSTor the Creator of the Universe, 

iSTor even of the shadows least thereiu. 

More than that thiug, in Egypt known as Kueph. 

The Word, mere emanation of the Mind, 

Can onl}^ on the Mind beget in turn, 

However it through matter operate : 

Thus, Tristian, tliou shalt ken, the Sou of Man 

Has called hiuiself, sole offspring of the Word, 

But for no other Man would undertake 

Its restitution from that labled Fall. 

Aud, for he had no mediate one on earth, 

AYho would acknowledge him, to be his son, 

He made our Father his immediate. 

And called himself, that heavenly Father's son. 

Now thou'rt provided, Fll resume my on : 

It was not long, ere he was conscious made, 

That Man's peculiar ailment found its cure 

But in the minist'ring to other Man : 

The Baptist, as a hardy pioneer. 

Preceding him, had then prepared the change. 

When both in public met on Jordan's bank, 

And Jesus thence began, where further on 

The other could not go. At this, thy stage. 

Thou knowst how high a dove and voice descend. 

For Heaven is no cloud, however high. 

Thus i)uslied b,y stress of consciousness, that now 

He must begin to act, lirni willed to do. 

He vibrated yet 'tween the opijosites 

Of physical and spiritual force. 

And this he settled in that wilderness. 

Oh Man, Avho needs wilt table 'gainst the Truth, 

Do'st thou not see, how little thou do'st make 

Of Providence, by feigning that the Fall, 

And Man's Eedemption occupied our God, 

From when he fell, until he was redeemed ; 

Whilst all his pondering for four thousand years 

llequired the supplementing by the thoughts, 

Wliich forty days' seclusion would suggest? 

If thou but little wouldst reflect on this, 

Thou wouldst know better where thy counsel lies. '' 

'^ Blest Spirit, did I not already feel 

Whnt theji to me, I'd know, contrasting thee. 



MAN.' 73 

A truthful Spirit, with that lying one, 

Who, in that wiklerness, temptation urged 

Upon the Son of Man, from whom he yet 

Did not depart, with that severe rebuff, 

AVherewith my spirit woukl have daunted him, 

For, singly jntted, I would ne'er concede 

A solitary foot of God's own earth 

Unto that Satan, much less countenance 

His impudent pretensions to the whole ; 

For though, on earth, the rule usurping, he 

Sway in iniquity, now more, now less. 

Yet he\s but factor, Heaven is the chief. " 

'' Thou judgest well. Within that wiklerness, 

The Son of jMan, consulting his own times, 

Conned by their cast, that they were all against 

That one Messiah, hoped for by the Jews, 

Who should release them from the foreign yoke. 

And raise them in the scale of nations first j 

For this the goal, to whicli, like Streams to Main, 

All Jewish aspirations urged for aye. 

Despite the glosses, since forced on their Writ. 

Yet, scarce regretting, that the door was shut 

Where he was disinclined to venture in. 

The resolution forced itself on him, 

That his Messlahship he would falllll. 

In manner pointed by his nature's bent, 

And through his people, if they would ; if not. 

Then on the Gentiles he'd his mission graft. 

He entered on it with the heaviest heart. 

That ever turmoiled in the human breast : 

Man unctuously may skip that grievous heave, 

But thou canst know, who fell'st a kindred pang, 

What was his agony, when he complained : 

" My soul is sick, ay even unto death. " 

Kot of the pangs, which he endured on earth, 

Did crucifixion stretch him to the worst. 

For then he knew, he had achieved his goal ; 

But, who conceives, how quells the mildew blight, 

Which the ignoring by his kindred blows 

Upon a soul, with aching sensitive 

More keenly as she strives for highest aim 1 

Yea, they, who but the Spirit simulate, 

Will never meet grim Failure's staring ghost, 

AYhich there forbids, where cheering breast is sought. 

Not they, who in their x^arish-mansions laze, 

Assured, of being faithful thousands' care, 

Will ever, even imitating, feel 

The pangs of him, who is a pensioner 

There, where his home is but by sufterauce, 

Where, dreamer he, 'mongst rude mechanic kin, 



74 MAN. 

Witli all, that gossips in liis mother's ear 

Still croaked, liow, imiovating, lie would end. 

Insinuated bears : Why works not lie ? ^' 

For lieaveii'S manna never fell for liim, 

Tliougb credited to be the Son of God. 

Yea, foxes liave tbeir boles, and birds their nests, 

Man's Son bad not a where, to lay bis bead. 

Thus from necessity, not choice, be took 

His first disciples from the poor and rude ; 

Yet his exuberant spirit had the might 

To quell, not only what disturbed within, 

But to aggress on Wrong, wherever met : 

Had be been passive, he would have succumbed, 

For when our goodness unresisting bends, 

'Tis quickly trodden under foot and crushed. 

When he is dubbed a lamb, and Prince of Peace, 

Thou'lt understand, that private peace is meant, 

For as a drought-rid country deprecates 

The sun, and prays for storms j so will that land, 

Where rank Iniquity is let by Peace 

To thrive imcropperl, till all its good be chocked, 

At last reach for the fiery scythe of War, 

Y^ea, Civil War, to raze it from its soil. 

And when 'tis needed, ever be most blest, 

Who fights it best, not be, who brings the Peace, 

For best Peace-maker is a well fought War ; 

But ever blest are they, who so dispose 

In ruling or in being ruled, that War 

Be made least necessary to mankind. 

Himself, correcting bis disciples, said : 

''Think not, that I am come, as sending peace ; 

I came, to send a sword, not peace, on earth." 

Again , mankind he sorted in two ranks : 

Who was not for him, was to him opposed j 

Thongh, thou bis other version Avilt prefer : 

" All, who do not oppose, advantage us. " 

Thus, 'tis judicious, that thou substitute 

The spirit often for its very garb. 

Else would thy sense ken but absurdity : 

Thus, Tristiau, I warn thee, once for all, 

That thou wilt never whine that maudlin wail. 

Which execrates this earth a woefnl i)it ; 

For never S^nrit will conceive, how Man 

May hold assurance of an after bliss. 

Whose earnest, given in this very stage 

Of his first being, he so fain contemns. 

I know, though from tbj^ birth unto this hour, 

Thy stock of life has but in spirit bloomed. 

And in the substance with privation drooped, 

Which clings to thee, as 'twere inherent, yet. 



MAK. 75 

Thou grinning mok'st it out of countenance, 

And, thus perhaps the happiest wretch on earth. 

Thou knowst, were there no foal, there were no fair, 

And both are welcome to thy equal mind ; 

For thou hast never yet forgot, this eartb, 

As part the universe, is too of Cxod, 

And who thus deals is blest : all could be so, 

If that elixir. Heaven stored within, 

They'd not adulterate with foreign stuff. 

Thus, though thyself art ail indifferent 

To worldly riches, whose possessors' hope 

For Heaven, by the Writ, is narrowed down 

To little else, than naught, 3'et thou well knowst. 

That, but for wealth, the great design of God 

Would of its purpose fail. The evil lies, 

Xot in its ownership, but in the means. 

Whereby it is acquired, and in the ends, 

Which it is made the instrument to work. 

Though they, who shine the tirmest in the faitli, 

Love riches in their mind and i)ractice more, 

And Heaven more in mere professing, yet 

Man never so exults, as when he learns, 

That God, through Mammon, has been served by Man. 

Well know I, Tristian, ere thou hadst my lore, 

That precept given unto Man, to love 

His enemies, seemed but a stumbling block. 

Which all life's teachings bade thee to avoid ; 

But if thou wilt approach it in my light, 

Thou shalt discover it a shining mark : 

For often Man, Avhen he offended Man, 

Is like a child, that has its playmate hurt. 

And, in own sorrow, weeps v> ith louder cry. 

But I need not elucidate still more, 

What now is clear to thee. Yet waits the earth, 

Tq be inherited, b}' who are meek ; 

For they in that, as in more promises 

Which are but bare, must still abide, until 

It be demised by them, who self assert. 

With might and craft, i)ossession of the earth, 

Which they will hold, while it is to be owned, 

Unless the meek their spirit will exert. 

The poor in spirit I shall not deprive 

Of what, in Scripture, they have been assured : 

If, in its barrenness, they will elect 

To enter Heaven, 'twere a sheer abuse 

Of Spirit, were they bid, to better it. 

What mischief it will work, to make the stone, 

The builders in the founding disallowed, 

Without a further test, the corner's head, 

But only for it was a castaway, 



76 MAN. 

Thou knowst, alas ! too well. No less tliou kuow'st, 

That of all marriages, but only those, 

Which HeaYeIl^s thanked for, were in Heaven joined. 

I deem, thou ownst no greater hankeriog 

For miracles, bequethed in the new, 

Than those iu that old Testament, for still. 

This rule will only fail with yonder sun : 

The wonders, that are not, exist for him. 

Who cannot see the miracles, that are : 

Man, prone to error, if he so inclines, 

May fix his notion of the sheen of day. 

From twilight's dusk, but never mid-day sun 

Shall shine for him. Why borrow from an age, 

Itself so lacking in intelligence. 

And visionary iu its ignorance. 

As to see devils in distempered brains, 

Whose wretched owners shamed that hallowed Age, 

That cast them out into the wilderness, 

IJnhospitalled, abandoned by their kind '? 

On these and them, who in the body ailed. 

The Son of Mau, alone, compassion took, 

And, as he healed them in his Spirit's ken. 

He ministered to his own aching self. 

Although, thou erst a predilection own'dst 

For his converting water into wine. 

Well pass that miracle, and scan instead 

Where he revived the dead. Thou'lt bear in mind, 

Eevivification for this earthly state 

To Eesurrection for eternity. 

As shadow to its substance, scarce compares. 

In Jairas' daughter, and in Lazarus, 

The very reasons, which I have adduced, * 

To settle the necessity of death. 

When we discussed that Eden's maudlin woe. 

Are all as potent for our argument 

Against mankind's recall iTom Death to Life. 

Yet grant, if so thou wilt, that these were dead. 

And then revived : they are not now alive, 

And what availed it wretched Lazarus, 

To drag his ache and grave corrupted flesh, 

Anew upon the green earth he usurped ? 

Though Man loves life, his spirit ill abides 

hi hlthy mansion, whence it fain would flee. 

I warn thee also, heed, lest this shall prove, 

That earthly life is preferable to 

That bliss eternal, promised by the Son, 

For if his Heaven be, these thence recalled, 

Instead of blest, were wronged in the exchange. 

Kow, in his mission, fast that crisis neared, 

]S"o more to be reiu'essed, than from the womb 



MA2f. 77 

The infant's exit. Would lie save himself, 

He either must expatriate himself, 

Or stay his innovation : he resolved, 

To stand his course -, thou knowst what was the stake ! 

O Crook of Error ! God in human form ! 

What else, hut sacrificed, could he liave been f 

Did he not know, he must not onlj^ vouch, 

But demonstrate himself a god in might ? 

Knew he not, if the eagle will alight 

Upon that farm-yard's hill, 'twill not be long 

Before its trusty roosters, spying round. 

Will glance beneath his wings, when, woe to him ! 

If in the clouds he beak and talons left. 

He'll quickly be their sport, their mock, their prey ! 

Hid he not know, what through the oether soared, 

Is but a duster, when in Bridget's hand ! 

My human friend, 'tis strange, yea, passing strange, 

—Unless the Writ, and all since writ mistake — 

That mystery in Heaven should be one, 

And other be that mystery on earth ! 

What to its Cherubim and Seraphim, 

Its Hiearchies, Principalities, 

In heaven had been blazoned since that time, 

Whereof no fable, much less memory 

Of Man runs counter, on this nether globe, 

Has been forbidden as a secret, and 

Mankind must be redeemed, through stealth, for he 

Who came, as sent to save, has been betrayed, 

By being signalized, identified ! 

That he was thus undone, reveals to thee, 

How was his mission spread the country round. 

And where that legion angels' garrison. 

Thou hast, ere this, conjectured in thy mind. 

We now approach the first fruits of that grace : 

The Resurrection and Ascension hence. 

And when its rind is broke, thou shalt behold 

That fruit from Palestine is but the kind. 

As real, or fabled, lloats upon its sea. 

Hid not thy soul abhor to generate 

Helusions whereupon she afterwards 

Must, like a parent on its offspring, feed ; 

Were she not sickened, by the more report 

Of those delusions, which the outside world 

Obtrusively would ever gorge thee with ^ 

Were not eternal, never changing Truth 

The only sustenance, that sates thy soul, 

For which no Myths, with all their progenies, 

How captivating, and how suave they be. 

Can serve as substituted o])iates, 

I would not break, where Time is crumbling fast : 



78 MAN. 

Thou wilt remember, the old Testament, 

In diverse phrase, of Eesurrection speaks, 

But less in sense of spirit than of flesh : 

So too, the latter's Eesurrection was 

By Eastern Magi as a tenet held, 

As by the Pharisees, ere Jesus' birth : 

As then the question had, in Palestine, 

Almost to epoch swelled, it was resolved, 

The Dispensation would not be complete. 

Unless its demonstration it produced. 

How hell's incurred, is told in : " Who shall say 

Thou fool, shall be in danger of its fire. " 

That such indefinite assertions too, 

Would have sufficed for Immortality ; 

If well enough would have been let alone. 

In what was said of eye, and ear, and heart. 

Faith still might promise that, whose evidence 

Is by its testimony now destroj-ed : 

But, since the allegation had been made, 

The witness must be called, and he has failed ! 

I'll not refresh the hoar hypothesis, 

Thafc Jesus, in a trance, was sepulchred ; 

Nor will I call those angels to account, 

For having: folded, and not flapped their wings. 

Which made them seem as only men to some, 

Who were the heralds of the emptied tomb, 

For even their celestial hardihood. 

Already strained, in that unmeasured flight, 

Still speedier urged, to timely light on earth, 

Was sore, exhausted, by the rolling of 

That pond'rous stone, whereon they took their rest ; 

Nor will I enter at that door of doubt, 

Through which some of his own disciples strayed. 

Since his appearing apparition-like, 

When disentombed, had shut it only half ; 

Whereas, he would have closed it with a bolt. 

Which but the hand of Time had drawn at last. 

If resurrected, he had gone abroad, 

Like his apostles, and proclaimed himself. 

This would have been an Alps of Peter's Bocks, 

And there have much achieved, where most it failed. 

Perhaps some will object : Had he done so 

The Jews would have repeated : ^' What do we f '^ 

And doomed his death once more. But let such know, 

Could they have raised the bar, the Eoman law 

Would then have interposed against their spite, 

A second resurrection had undone 

A second death, as easily as the first ; 

To this there is no counter argument. 

Yet I dispense with it, and now shall test 



MA JUT. 

With thee, the proof, for which, be thou, this once, 

Perverse in rank credulity, like they, 

Who would, with reason prove, tbat Eeason's naught ; 

Yea, for this once, own that disciple's faith. 

Who, for helieviDg most, was most beloved ; 

Then join to it that of the learned Paul, 

Who, gloryiug, feigned that Death, as Man's hist foe, 

Was by that Resurrection done away, 

And, as I question, say but yea and nay : 

Imagine this, to be thy hour of death : 

At once, quick Katnre, strict economist, 

Proceeds to reimburse herself, in what 

She had advanced thee tor thy tenement. 

For never may her Capital decrease ; 

This day yet sinks thee coffined in thy grave. 

Where, by her factors, thon art decomposed. 

And sorted back into her elements, 

Which from her reservoir she restless loans, 

Perhaps, in part, unto a neighboring tree. 

Which, drawing on her, roots thee from thy grave, 

Whence, in two hundred years, thou'lt be absorbed. 

I^ow mark : shall that, thy corpse, rise from its tomb. 

And in three days ? Shalt thou then walk abroad, 

Upon this very earth, for forty days, 

In manner as has been thy wont ere death. 

Which were, indeed, a sorry coming back ? 

Shall fish and honey-comb ]>ass in that corps, 

Whose cold vitality oozed in the ground 

Ere yet itself was part of it ? Shalt thou, 

Thereon, ascend a mountain with thy friends. 

To height, live hundred or five thousand feet. 

And there be parted from them in a wink. 

By intervening, mount-beshrondiug cloud ? 

Shalt thou rise further, on that cloud, from them, 

Who, upward gazing, are accosted by 

Two strangers, mark ! not angels, but mere men. 

Who rally then}^ why they stand gazing there 

To heavenward, to where thon hast been raised. 

And Avhence thou shalt return, as thou didst go ? 

" Great Spirit pause, for I see tlirough it all : 

If 'twere for that, Olympus was exchanged 

For Olivet, then pity for the blood. 

Which afterwards was given still to boot ! 

Yet, if thou further deigning, wilt comment 

Upon those things, Avhich — hoped for, and unseen. 

As substance, and as evidence of faith — 

Have been revealed, I shall be edified, 

Where now I'm blinded by the gloried glare, 

And if, through inadvertence, or design. 

Thou shouldst add to those things, or take away 



80 MA N-. 

From the ineffable, eternal Trords 
In sainted Jolin's sublime obscurity, 
I shall assume the plagues, therein denounced, 
Yea, gladly stake, if not already lost, 
The part I own, within is book of life, 
And its uncandled 'New Jerusalem. '^ 
'' Supurfluous is Saint John's Anathema, 
Since he^s foredoomed, a time and half a time, 
Who still more threats, and, for that matter too. 
More promised goodies could conceive, than he, 
Who, for the asking, gives the Morning Star 
x4.nd, Shade of Moses ! to the tree of life 
Invites as 'twere a frost-bit orchard tree. 
What though that physic's great philosopher, 
Whose vision opened on an api)le's fall. 
And fell, when pondering on that Eden's Fall, 
At last confessed, that blooming nonsense' worth 
Ooukl be but known, when to the market brought ? 
Let them who'd fain assess, take courage still j 
For, if they'll only school their student brains 
In Daniel's visions, and those Prophets' Avhence 
That lion-charmer gleamed the fruitful seed, 
They haply may prognosticate that boon. 
But then, w^hat would it reck ? Has not Saint John, 
With pat, prophetic sportiveness, forestalled 
That heaven offered Understanding's prize. 
In having told, the number of the beast 
To be six hundred and three score and six ? 
But, since thyself, though once, canst never more 
Be one of those odd liundred thousand saints, 
Who were, on earth, with Avoman undefiled, 
And shalttiot mumble that new song, nor be 
A hardy harper harping on thy hari). 
But rather deemst, that if thy kind were made, 
To trust for their eterniy such stuff, 
As there revealed, it would be better far, 
If man were such a saint, and, in his qAit 
Of procreation, made an end of Man, 
We shall reverse its parting bid, and say : 
" Let him, who's iilthy, purge his iilthiness," 
And close it with the hope, that when again 
A revelation is from heaven sent. 
The chosen medium will knoAv, at least, 
As much astronomy, as veriest dunce. 
For opening lore upon the Church suffice : 
What has beginning, needs must have an end'j 
. Saint Peter's crucifixion is her type, 
For, as he's painted there, with downward head, 
So is the system reared with Reason down, 
And founded onlv on the base of Faith. 



MAN. 81 

From this eouclude, in tbat disseusiou sprung, 
Between the l^ope and liis opponents on 
The doctrine of Infallibility, 
Wiiich side, as the consistent, is the true 
And very champion of the age vexed church. 
• As from its pedigree thou knowst, the myth 
Of that original sin, the Fall of Man 
AVas hatched from that Egyptian Serpent's eg^ ; 
So 'twill astonish thee, who art but Man, 
And canst not spy, like I, the spirit's germ, 
That on a mere and casual play of words, 
Such as thy English bard delighted in, 
The whole foundation of that church is laid : 
Thou knowst, in their vernacular, the names 
Of Cephas and of Peter mean a rock ; 
Yet there's but one foundation iu the worhl. 
The gate of hell, a figurative name 
For wear of time, cannot prevail against: 
It is the Spirit, and that is no rock ! 
AYho, by so vonching, would eternize that. 
Which is not sempiternal of itself, 
Must from the jaw of Time first draw the teeth, 
Which, thou knowst, even Jesus has not done. 
In the thereafter history of Man, 
Judge, whether Evil, designated Hell, 
Had any, and what part within the Church, 
Whose love, how great 'tis for the Son of Man, 
And his for her, thou, in that Song of Songs, 
Findst simulated in its syllabus ; 
Though verily, if thou peruse the text, 
Thou readst a love-duet 'tween Solomon 
And his Egyptian bride, and nothing more % 
Yet when the Truth prevails, Man shall confess. 
He in the fabled marriage was more wronged, 
Than in the true, is feigned of Solomon. 
But be that Song perverted still to Cant, 
The bond of love, professed by Church to Man, 
Was tightest then, when most by tithes confirmed. 
Thou knowst, as proof of proofs is oft adduced 
Saint Paul's conversion and apostleship : 
Of changers' reasons, still their own is best 5 
If tliou'dst be edified by shifting Man, 
Then see how crowded, in thy day, that bridge, 
Which Power throws between a rising cause 
And its decrepit, barren opposite. 
Y^ea, hard on earth that heaven must abut, 
^Vhose counsel savors so of polic}'. 
As that »' 'Tis hard to kick against the pricks. " 
But 'tis no marvel, since the Son of Man 
Had but so recently returned from earth, 



82 MAN, 

As scarce to have had time, to cloif its wonts, 

And reassume those of eternity. 

The lore upon the meaning' of that Grace, 

Through which mankind obtained that hair-breadth 

chance 
For boundless, nameless, and eternal bliss — 
Be't fabricated by the whole in books. 
Or dealt in sermons by the quantity, 
In quality is i^rime and uniform, 
And, further of it, I will say but this : 
The most ungracious showing Man can make 
To his Creator is, to think of Him, 
As having wrought imperfect His design, 
And after deigned, to mend it in a part. 
Perchance, thou marvelst why the chosen Seed 
Disdained to own atonement for that Fall ? 
Ken then, no dire chimera was that Fall, 
Until the Dispensation made it one. 
Thou knowst, that much was strained, in order that 
As it was written, it might be fulfilled. 
Time doffs and dons, yet to her end, the Christ 
Will for his love of Man, be loved again, 
Yet if thou strip the faithful of that love. 
In every professing Christian^ 
Thou ever shalt but find the Jesuit. 



MAN. 83 



OA.]SrTO VII. 



CONTENTS. 

An Era aiul Eternity. Rome : Tiberius, Caligula, Nero. Cause 
of Jerusalem's Destruction. Mankind's Evangelization. Ju- 
lian and the Church. Tlie Cross as Religion's Type. Maho- 
met. The Millenium. 

Eartli ! tliou petty mould, wherein is cast 
For everlasting tiuie : as tliou art gauged 
By thy recorded products, thou indeed 

Seem'st not, to present Man, the earth, from which 

Himself, and all, that now exists have sprung. 

Yet, self correcting, self renewing, thou 

Art now as pristine as at farthest date 

Man's vision strays in his review of Man. 

Let Man still justify the fabled ways 

Ot God to him, and shyly pass the real. 

For these, Himself but can, and will assert. 

Thus Tristian, musing, felt the Spirit near. 

And him addressed, with soul i)repared for lore, 

As ploughed up field, in spring, is for its seed: 

"■ O Spirit, my Instructor, ever blest ! 

As now, come still uubid, for well thou kuow'st, 

Brief is my stay on earth, and then, with thee, 

1 shall abide through that eternity. 

For w^hich but thou, alone, canst train my soul. 

Much, Spirit, I, thy pupil would prefer. 

To hear thy lore on yonder million worlds. 

And their inhabitants, did I not feel, 

My thither way leads only through my kind : 

Thou know'st my present drifting, therefore be 

Upon this stranger Main my Pilot still. '' 

" 'Tis Novelty, that gives to life its spice : 

Thou art bewildered, for this earth endured 

The fiendish horrors, havocs, all the woes, 

Which Man has wrought on Man, as if he were, 

Of less account than vermin, to be quelled. 

Yea, thou hast strayed, wl^re Doubt has grasped thy 

hand, 
And led thee, as it were, unto the quest : 



84 MAK. 

Is God a fiieud, or enemy of Man ? 

There ^rt tliou even on the very way, 

To sound eternity, of which, what there 

AT)palls thy soul, is necessary part. 

Erom what's behind, discern what lies before, 

And thus, thou'lt gain a fair conception of 

The future evolutions of mankind ; 

And, as Intelligence converts to balm, 

What is a bane to Ignorance, thou'lt ken, 

Each Age has settled its own reckonings : 

Eor, all rewards and punishments of Man 

Come only through the medium of that law, 

Which runs coeval with the universe. 

But let us still proceed in order, lest, 

In its imparting, fractured be my lore : 

How deem'st thou, Man ! in that eternity. 

All they will be at home, for whom this world 

Already is too old ? Eor whom, as 'twere, 

It does exist, not nineteen hundred years 1 

Yea, they, who through ignoring, that mankind 

At all accounted ere that period, 

Profess, to merit everlasting life ? 

Thou knowst, how through that water-cure on earth, 

The i)ost-diluvians have been improved : 

If Man's regeneration, through the blood. 

Has fared no better, thou knowst whence the cause. 

Though Man is indispensable to Man, 

The noblest never will desire advance. 

Through other's merit : if not through their own. 

They 'il hold as naught, the greatest boon in reach. 

But fitfully, till present times, has Eome 

B4JJoycd that happiness, which then it knew. 

Beneath Augustus' long enlightened reign. 

And very modern also is tlie day. 

That Genius has in the public found 

The sure Maecenas Avhom it mostly lacked. 

But soon, a shift of rulers wrought its change : 

As foulest weatiier, in the summer's height. 

Disastrous breaks upon the fairest noon. 

So fell Tiberius' reign on happy Eome. 

Yea, of all evil, that has cursed mankind, 

The worst springs from degenerated forms. 

Which of <leparted goodness iiaunt the name, 

Like broken iirms tlieir gilded signs: to mock 

All them, Avho'd seek wiUiin. Alas ! not then, 

Old Ivome had learnt, what scarcethe world knows now 

That Vice exists on earth, to be subdued. 

Instead of raised, since, of itself, it grows, 

And needs the fost'ring hand, no more than weeds. 

In individual Man, and in the mass, 



MA IT. 85 

The government will vibrate, as tlie beam, 

Between the scales of Evil and of Good : 

The heavier weight inclines it to its side. 

When thou wast untaught in experience, 

And readst, Caligula did raise his horse 

Into the Consulate, thou blessedst fate, 

That thou didst live, in other age and land. 

Where no such mock'ry could be improvised. 

Consider but ci moment, and rellect : 

That animal could neither sell its vote, 

Commit no perjury, nor peculate, 

Nor yet intrigue against deserving Man 

With vilest sycophants, who would have neighed, 

To get its favor in, or for a place. 

Whose base perversion they in turn had pledged^ 

To ease, and gratify their patron's itch 

For further power from the Sovereign. 

Unable thus, to execute its charge. 

It neither could abuse it, all it did. 

Was but to make a fallen office null. 

How many legislators curse thy land. 

Whose ignorance were standard, were it not, 

By their inherent devil's craft alloyed ? 

Tbat pawing Consul was the whim of Man, 

Whose brain had been impaired by Malady ; 

Those legislators are a system's weeds, 

Which now it teems, by overpraising rank. 

Then, jSTero, his successive lunatic 

Convinced the world, though Heaven had not made 

Himself a poet, yet he could undo, 

In Lucau, Avhat it had denied to him : 

These were the madhouse tricks of emperors ; 

Yet, in their direfulness, no couuterx)art 

To that unparalled Catastrophe, 

Which fell Delusion brought ui)on the Jews, 

Who, like a badger on his fat, fed on 

Their former fame and spirit, till, alas ! 

In their steep fall, ^ley lighted on one stay, 

But to be bounded on a worse below ! 

Thou readst, the J.ews were then deluded bj' 

False Prophets : if these were no wiser than 

Some of their true, they were destruction doomed : 

Yet Where's the test, between the true and false '? 

Are these but false, because not in the book ? 

It ever thou, unwarily, let'st slip 

Into thy lore of ancient history, 

The bastard offspring of perverted fact. 

That those dire horrors of Jerusalem, 

Besieged, and captured by the lioman arms, 

AVere Heaven's answer to that cballeDge spoke : 



so MAN, 

'* On us, aud on our Children be his blood" 

Then, Tristian, unless thou'dst shame the truth, 

I charge thee, oust it from thy memory : 

That Man, to suit his own perverted gait, 

Must feign God's ways awry, as are his own ! 

Does not the murder ot those innocents 

Content his craving for the crop of blood, 

But he must on the Son of Man entail, 

As death's atonement, such a sacrifice, 

As would outmonster all niithology % 

The soul appalling, and inhuman woes. 

The Jews then self inflicted, and endured. 

But from their dire infatuation sprang, 

That they, a petty fraction of mankind. 

Were God's own chosen people ; that the mass 

Were given over, Heaven knows to what ! 

It was the fixed belief, which had engrossed 

Their ethics, yea, past in their flesh and blood. 

That as the Lord's peculiar race elect. 

They would be Heaven succored 'gainst the world. 

Which made them wreak upon themselves such woes. 

As God was too considerate to doom 

On Man, through stranger, how so he'd transgress. 

If any single Man did cause those woes. 

It would be Moses, who first taught the Jews, 

That they, of Man, were God's peculiar Seed; 

Yet this imputing were but fetched from far, 

Since he, who writes a inimer for a Child, 

Is blameless, if the Man reads not beyond. 

But never were they doomed for merely their 

Eejecting Christ, who strove, but strove in vain. 

To undeceive them in that dire belief, 

AVhich he in his clear vision plainly saw. 

Was drawing tbeir destruction, in his Age. 

That he, Messiah, but not in their sense. 

He settled, lonely, in that wilderness. 

For, not of earth, could he his kingdom have. 

And, for that lack, the Jews would none of him. 

Yet, what had it availed, if in his sAise, 

They had accepted him a thousand times. 

Unless, the fond delusion they had doffed. 

That they, of Man, had been i)referred by God ? 

They still against the Eomans had rebelled. 

And, after, rued the same catastrophe. 

'Tis Keason's vigor, that Humanity 

Should parle.>^ with Infatuation, through 

Heroic Titus, the Delight of Man, 

And yet, propose in vain ! Had they then bent, 

Where, in resistance, they must needs be broke, 

They had retained their country, spared those woes 



MAW. 87 

Of lieudisli Persecution, wlieu dispersed -, 

Yea, they could afterwards have gained their goal, 

And been, of all the nations, first in rank, 

\Yhen from collai*)sed old Rome, new empires sprang ; 

Unless, they then, indeed, had proved themselves 

Elected only for their ignorance : 

But they, alas ! intoxicated by 

Delusion's thrill, deigned not, to intercept 

The stern, disastrous stroke of disabuse : 

Too late for them, it yet will prove too late 

For every people, self-destruction doomed. 

Those horrors barren died, where they were bred, 

But rank Delusiou, elsewhere, hatched her curse. 

The Jews, already satiate to their fill, 

With theologic lore, whereon they retched. 

Distempered by the surfeit, with disdain 

Rejected that, which with the Gentiles, then 

Riide in theology, was in demand. 

That yet some Hebrews were evangelized 

Gainsays not this, since 'tis notorious, 

iS'o people, wholly, are unanimous. 

^Yet, Tristian, thou mayst with reason ask: 
What was the urgency, their Testament, 
K?up])lanted then, should be engrafted on 
The Gentile world, on whom no greater scath 
Could be inflicted, than that Fall of Man ? 
This quest w^ould shake the keystone in the arch. 
Whereon the System's superstruction rests : 
How could Sal vatioiit have been vouched to Man, 
Unless, of doom he had been preconvinced "? 
Like edifice, without foundation built, 
Faith, lacking Fall, were pendent in the air. 
What merit 'tis, to make a sound Man sick, 
That one may claim the credit of his cure, 

' Let those assess, who arrogate it such. 
Of all, who in this age, yet fain parade 
The cicatrices on the stock of Man, 
W'here, in regeneration, it was lanced. 
But few would care, to know the many boils. 
That were inoculated 5 few would tell. 
From where the virus flowed ; and since, at last. 
Humanity has interposed her stay. 
Of all the creeds, which charge the fiendish blows. 
Dealt in the darkness of the middle age, 
ilow on the Rock, and on its slivers now. 
Which will confess, from where that darkness fell ! 
For, though no goodness is substantial, save 
It casts some shadow, in that Fall's ado. 
Where separates the kernel from the husk f 
Yea, Satan, in a fiction born, has been 



8S MAI^. 

By fiction quelled: The Evil still remains. 

'Tis its adaptedness to Age and Stage, 

TJiat makes tlie Present's boon, the Future's bane ; 

Thus Use to-day, tomorrow's oft Abuse: 

However Error may pretend and vaunt, 

The only Charter, which it can produce 

Js but its past existence, and that tiiUs 

The very moment when it is unmasked. 

As we revert our glance to conquering Eome, 

We'll find, she owned not more of happiness, 

Than did the nations, which she had subdued : 

Iniquity to every age and clime 

Is, like their righteousness, indigenous : 

Man patiently will on the native gorge. 

Where his maw retches at the foreign wrong. 

Whence Rome's declining rule and fall have" sprung, 

To ask, were bootless, since for mending past : 

Thou only needst to know, wherewith it teemed. 

To tell the culture of all bygone time. 

From what is sowed and reaped, in thy own time. 

Thou hast discovered, that thy government 

Eesponds not, relatively, more or less 

Unto the aspirations of thy age, 

Than did those reigns to those of ancient times : 

Their good and ill are only changed in sort, 

Not in degree, as time's respective types. 

Thou, who so prone to truth, thou canst not taste 

Mere tinctured liquid on the bare avouch. 

That it is honey, and then smack thy lips. 

With: Heaven, w^hat iueftable delight! 

To tickle Error's ear, and draw its smiles. 

Hast never juggled with such slandered fame 

As Julian's, Prince of all Apostates dubbed : 

Whom harmed he, when he staid the murd'rous hand 

Of Christians against their heretics, 

Restored their forfeits, called their exiles home ? 

Yea, when he pardoned those, who had conspired 

For his assassination ? Willed he wrong. 

To blend with Christian morality 

The ceremonies of mythology ? 

Did not the Rock — but careful, first to pluck 

His herb of tolerance — soon deck itself 

With that same moss, wherewith it still is rank ? 

Yea, but he would not make the Rock his throne ! 

There his oifense, for he had aptly spied, 

'Twonld prove a millstone on the neck of Truth. 

Let those, who miracle upon that quake, 

— Since it is well, there are such cronies too— 

Regret, they did not live, in what had been 

Their ^ery proper age: when deigned the LortI, 



MAN. 89 

To play those pantomimic tricks on earth, 

Whose like, for wonder ! godless heathens put 

On slighted Jove, and then the Christians bled ! 

But sooth, since Satan, by the Writ, owns earth. 

And all that spectacle sprang from below, 

Might not the pyrotechnist have been he ? 

Yea, Incredulity, forsooth thy heart 

Is harder than that Rock ! for Julian 

Disdained to be, once more, its renegade. 

As, in Fame's temple. Truth still supersedes 

Delusion in the Eectorshii), the shift. 

From niche to niche, unbiased will proceed. 

Those held by Julian and Constantine 

Are now revised, and each shall get his own. 

Man conquers from within, not by a sign. 

And he's best staid, who stands up by himself : 

'Twere now a barren quest, for Man to know. 

What factors wrought, before the gates ot Rome, 

That crown-fraught ^victory for Constantine ; 

'Not so his vision-sign, which Man, to- da}-, 

Still feigns to tyi)ify his tie to God ! 

Trust me, the Spirit, who have probed mankind, 

There never yet has lived that soul on earth, 

Who could, through misery, behold her God 

Whom she, in happiness, was blind to know : 

In plainest Words, know thou, the Cross is type, 

No more for Heaven, than it is for earth. 

In the imagination of mankind. 

It has too long translated to their God, 

And seeks, to still perpetuate with Him 

Man's transient wrong, a torturing instrument. 

Which Man, in shame of self, has long disowned. 

The Cross, between the earth and Heaven reared, 

Does wrong to both : it signifies to Man, 

That Heaven's All has been but wrought athward, 

Instead direct, and meetest for its ends j 

To Heaven it denotes, that Man perverse 

Construes its All, the very opposite. 

Of what it is, and wherefore it is made. 

Thus, in our course of Man, as we i)roceed. 

It hence shall stand, not in^ but hy our way, 

For woe is but the counterpart to weal, 

Essentially as indispensable. 

As night is to its day, or death to birth, 

For let Man know, that Life pervades the world f 

That Animation, and not Death, prevails : 

What's promised else, is feigned for Ignorance, 

And, while diverted with the time to come, 

Some other than herself enjoys the IS^ow. 

AVere all the happiness^ allotted Man, 



90 MAN. 

Apportioned justly there, where it is due, 

There were enough, to make the least rejoice ; 

And were no Man exempt, to bear the woe 

Himself has caused, the feeblest had the strength, 

To tread nn grumbling 'neath his proper load: 

]S'one can be favored, but some one is wronged. 

Thou shalt remark, wlio ever loudest cry 

This earth a vale of sorrow, or essay, 

To make it such, have been most provideut, 

T'appropriate the heights, where they migiit joy ; 

Yea, in tbe Age, on which my lore descants, 

They, who most prated of eternity, 

And of the bliss and grace thereof revealed, ■ 

jMade, for their dupes, life so intolerable. 

As only, for that hope, to be endured. 

8till, Avhat the bee, with skill and toil has hived, 

The trapi)er smacks at ease, while now, as then. 

The Cow is from the crib of Goodness fed. 

And in the dairy of Deception milked. 

AVell, Tristian, mayst thou compare the church 

Unto an heir, whose riot and abuse 

Are ouly limited by his estate ; 

Por had her founder yet endowed how more, 

She had been more extravagant in wroug. 

Scan that awry Millenium up and down, 

And thou shall read between, as in its lines, * 

Man mended his belief, but it was long, 

Ere he himself was bettered in his creed ; 

For, 'tis confessed by most, denied by few. 

The doom, which overhangs the temporal 

JJeiell the Spiritual Testament : 

Its l^etter part adhered fast to the hands 

Of those, who ministered on the estate. 

'Tis not for us, to question with the church, 

Why this Man's canouized, and that Man doomed, 

Since he, who builds a mansion can dispose, 

Who'll in its garret, in its cellar dwell ; 

Eor though mankind their highway further shift 

Erom where its heaven glares, the greater part. 

That shine therein, will still prefer to stay, 

Eor lack of other quarter in the world. 

s\ov is it now to us of consequence, 

AVhat councils then discussed, and what decreed 

As orthodoxy, or as heresy : ; 

What then was truth has been, will ever be, j 

And what was nonsense then, is nonsense still : t 

lievered to-day, to morrow 'tis ignored. j 

Xot long the Sword, placed there by Constantine, ) 

Lay in the Church's reach, ere she bethought J 

It had been brought on earth : 'tis sheathed now, t 






\ 



MA N', 91 

And ere 'tis drawn again, belike Mankind 
Will first explore, how it has been, that when, 
One was exalted to the Deity, 
Those thonsands were dementated to fiends. — 
Thou oft hast mused, what might that Age have been, 
If England or Eome's se^f, had lacked the boast, 
To have evangelized that heathen land, 
Whose native genius is philosophy. 
Instead the dreamy fiction of the East, 
Which i)ines exotic still on German soil ? 
Thou marvelst now no longer, since thou kenst. 
What, in her tournament. Humanity 
Must in her rounds achieve, ere she is crowned. 
'Twere curious to spy the mystic germs, 
Wherewith the Father stored His universe, 
Else thou mightst marvel of thy origin, 
And how, for aye, thou liadst existence lacked, 
If, likely by the stay of merest chance, 
Thy ancestors had not that besom slipt. 
Wherewith Attila swept his havoc down 
Along where bends the Ehine, from West to North, 
Meanw^hile that Scourge, amidst his mad career, 
Eushed to his ruin on a springtide Hood. — 
Thou by the thick'ning mist, which palls that Age, 
Art now apinized, we near that dreary dark. 
When ruling Superstition quelled the mind. 
And we must be content, to judge mankind. 
As we would him, who sleeping walks and acts. 
Thou knowst, that Man, yet holden by his wont, 
Woukl fain delude himself, to deem that Age 
An insubstantial dream, and though thyself. 
If Night must lack her stars, to calm, proferst 
The heavens into chaos lashed, yet know, 
As gloomiest fallow in th- economy 
Of nature is as indispensable 
As fairest teeming ; so in Providence, 
That middle one, in history styled dark, 
Is as essential, as this lustrous Age : 
That has accumulated, in the night. 
The store, from which the i)resent works, by day. 
'Tis but a mind, i)erverse in ignorance. 
Would wish, that God did expedite mankind 
Up to precociousness, since thou well knowst. 
Unfailing will those blinded fathers rue. 
Who raised their children, like a hothouse plant. — 
Tbe wronged, if lacking in their proper might, 
: Will, 'neath a patron's fold, their vengeance wreak, 

i As demonstrates that Havoc's seed and womb, 

• Jerusalem, in ruthless massacre 

Of three times thirty thousand Christians, 



92 MAN'. 

By thrice teu tlioiisaud Jews, who, leashed like hounds 

To Chosroes' baDiiers, panted but for blood, 

And left their prey nnplundered to their lord. 

Man had been substituted for the brutes, 

To furnish grateful sacrifice to God, 

And, for six hundred years, had gained, and lost 

Beneath the fitful discipline of one, 

When lo ! a second Dispensation, pat 

Is uttered by Mahomet from his cave I 

xls competition commercb animates. 

So rivalry in faiths evolves the light, 

And, long ago, thou guardst tbyself against 

The overweening, that a soul was doomed, 

For i^assing by another path than thine. 

Across the threshold to eternity. 

Yea, Prophet sure he was, however else ; 

But whether true or false, what is the test 

Save Eeason ! Yet, 'tis ding-donged in Man's ear, 

That Eeason cannot criticize in faith, 

Which thus were left to only accident 

Of Man's nativity and bringing up ! 

Thus likely, if, instead the Christians, 

The Saracens had victors proved at Tours, 

Thyself hadst been a Moslem born and bred ! 

How would that score f If thou apply to it 

That test of Writ : " If so it be of God, 

It will prevail ; if not, it needs must fall. " 

Then its own charter is as well avouched 

By time, as is thy Dispensation's own. 

Thus see, O Man ! to what absurdity 

Thy mind will drift, if thou thy reason cast. 

Bejection makes a Prophet false one day. 

And true the next, another time he's both. 

Because accepted : What recks this to Man ? 

Both by compulsion and by argument. 

The time is past, for making proselytes 

Of even heathens : all are in their faith 

As obstinate, as they, who would convert. 

Let Man still jog the missionary path. 

His own delusion is his journey's end, 

For if he tread not on the highway of 

Humanity, to which but branching roads 

Are all the creeds, had he been of the Jews, 

And heard the Founder's self his gospel spread, 

His words had fallen dead ux)on his ears. 

Though, in the Eesurrection of the flesh, 

Man, saved by grace, partakes the Islam's creed. 

Yet is he stranger to its nice details, 

AVhich show that doom, of such engrossing awe. 

That Vision, though revivitied in all. 



MAF. 

Yea even them, wlio have been blind in life, 

Yet stays benumbed to admiration for 

The beauteous forms, wliich there shall he revealed : 

Yet what he misses in that ignorance, 

He more than gains in the unconsciousness 

Of what a imnishment the Prophet fixed 

For all, who lucre itching, i^eculate, 

And but with public plunder sate themselves. 

Yea, when that retribution's realized. 

By how much more, than in this normal time, 

Shall all the countries, on that day of doom, 

In swine production, be outdone by that, 

Which boasts, it can supply the world with pork ? 

Yea, how those legion devils then shall greet 

With comrade grunting them, who now profess 

Upon the miracle, that sealed their fate ? 

Then shall be rued, Columbus did not live 

Before divine Saint John: revealed by him. 

The doom, now in the Prophet scofied, were dread, 

And then his words, burning a sample-scorch. 

Had warned them from the hre, they bargained for! 

Still faithed souls are sorely tur moiled by 

Predestination and Free Will : though true, 

The thistle bears no grapes, yet less in self 

Than in their uses lies the excellence. 

Or viciousaess of all created things 5 

For, as the grapes' expressed, feraiented juice 

Will whirl a Man into Elysium ; 

So its abuse will throw him in the copse. 

Where demonized, he'll execrate his God 

Beside that thistle where the linch is i)erched. 

Who, with distended throat, exulting pours 

His anthems to the Giver of the seed. 

'Tis also true, that no one can dispose 

Of what he does not own, yet what he has 

He owns to cultivate: the souls of Man 

Are varied as the surface of the earth. 

And, as each represents a several patch, 

So Man tills its reflexion in himself: 

In fertile spot, where hand of Art scarce touched, 

A clump will grandly loom as nature's park, 

AVhilst opposite, the sand and rock require 

Manure, yea even soil, ere they produce : 

Yet, though these cannot pamper parasites, 

They'll bear the vine ; again, with i)eppermint, 

j\lan may supplant the belladonna's stalk. 

But back to whence we bent : Let still those lands 

Claim Charlemagne, in tripartite, their own : 

What grounds one of them has, to raise his praise, 

Its sages may explore, if they will trace, 



94: MAJSr. ' 

From that tribnual of Wcstplialia, 

The dark descend unto that peace thence named. 

But we'll ask neither for a share in him, 

Who would, through tortures and through massacres, 

Convert to Him, of winch himself knewnaught : 

Of all the creeds, that have been forced on Man, 

The worst is good enough to live thereby. 

The best scarce worth, that Man should die for it. 

High sainted by the Church, through victims' shrieks, 

We let him rest, as in our lore of Man 

We pass with him, that beauty rav'ning Pope, 

The second Gregory; that blinding Pope, 

The fourth of Stephans ; nor shall we discuss, 

As did the Priesthood, whether that Joan 

Was raised to Pope, through Satan, or what else ; 

To us. Pope Xicholas may dolf or keep 

The name of Satan, which those Bishops gave ; 

Nor yet the archives we-11 undust, to fix 

How oft Marozia was the concubine. 

The mother, or the grandam of a Pope, 

Or whether, at one time, she was all these j 

And whether John, the twelvth, when Pope, did meet, 

And fight the devil, or the spouse, whose wife 

He was embracing caught, concerns us none : 

Thou knowst, the dark invites to many deeds. 

Which day-light never would suggest to Man. 

Had the Pontificate, a thousaud times. 

Been traded, first for gold, and last for crime, 

Hadst thou lived then, thou hadst not bid for it ; 

Nor, since thou hadst no stock nor dividend, 

Couldst thou have in that holy traftic shared 

Of saints', apostles', or of martyrs' bones, 

The Cross's wood, and virgin Mary's hair. 

From all of which, we in onr lore deflect. 

To bow to Alfred, England's noble Xing, 

To German Henry, as the Fowler knowu. 

To Otho, named the First, his worthy son. 

And then, we'll issue from the Christian dark 

To where the Moslems held enlightened sway : 

To Seville, where in ha|)piness abode 

Three hundred thousand of the human race ; 

Then to Cordova, which that number owned, 

In houses only, and was then the home 

Of most the culture in that fallow Age. 

What cause Hispania has, to joy or rue, 

That, in her firmament, the Crescent then 

Has been unsphered, she from her church-lore knows : 

She with her Spirit did experiment, 

As does the yeoman with his orchard choir. 

Which, ousted once, can never back be lured. 



ITAJV. 95 

Tliou oft hast on the disillusion mused 
Of him, who bought a homestead, by the plan, 
Which represented its surroundings such, 
As 'twere located in a fairy land, 
But who, on view discovered, to his grief, 
His purchase was imagination reared. 
And its locality had been usurped. 
By but the country's outlawed criminals : 
That Eevelation is the paper plan ; 
Its disillusion, the Millenium, 
Of whose drear freight, thou hast the manifest ; 
Yet, Man will hanker for the Golden Age ! 
Knows he not, lions are no longer such. 
When they shall teach their whelps, to feed on grass ? 
Behold that time, when they should gorge on straw. 
The while that Satan, bared of rule on earth, 
Lay bound within that ijit, shut up and sealed. 
More than that maudlin grace, in latter days, 
To Man , ineffable, was in that Age, 
The dark, excruciating, fell despair. 
In which he verily endured those woes. 
Which had been fabled to succeed the lapse 
Of that Millenium, Man ever 'waits ! 
Thou marvelst, whence that dark : Is it not meet, 
That cross of heavenly bodies work eclipse. 
And that its shadow hide the light from Man ? 
If Man will hanker for obscurity. 
He needs must retch at deeds, which it begets : 
As burglars, breaking in a domicile, 
First chloroform the chambered occux)ants. 
To pill at leisure, and secure their prey. 
While waking victims, to stay unbenumbed, 
Turn from the vapor, yet dare not alarm ; 
So in the Sliade, that hooded then the earth, 
Man's evil passions preyed upon his kind, 
Who, drowsed by dark, were fumed in ignorance, 
Whilst many honest laymen, popes and priests, 
AVho were above the stupor of that Age, 
Yet dared not stir, much less alarm their kind. 
In dread of being cast from sphere and life j 
For Man, then drowsing, would not be disturbed 
Out of his uniform stupidity ; 
And numberless the host this very day. 
Who by their jerky winks and yawns betray, 
Tliey were awakened somewhat ere their time, 
And would relapse into oblivion, 
If pressed, but gently, by somnihc dark. 
No denser than that parting shadow's skirt. 
Thus have we past the reign with Satan bound : 
How 'twas, when he in proi)er person swayed, 



96 MAN^. 

We next sliall scan : if worse, than tlirougli his imps. 
The Devil need innst have outdone himself. 



MAN. 97 



CA.NTO V^III. 



CONTENTS. 

The Body's Relatiou to the Soul. Nonialtiliineut of Prophesies :_ 
Disiliusion. Time the sole Revealer. The Crusades : Church of 
Rome and Protestant Sects. Wars, Science and Creed. Nobili- 
ty and the People. The Inqiusition. The Church and Civili- 
zation. 

As forest teuauts, ever provident, 

Warned by the falling leaves of coming deartli, 

Themselves outbustle in their hurried leaps 

Between the hazel copse and lofty nest, 

Where still they garner, and assort their hoards -, 

So Tristian, with keener eagerness, 

As Eeason more, than Instinct bids provide, 

Admonished by his years, how near the turn 

From harvest to consumption he was drawn. 

And conscious, that in life, there is no hour 

So liberal, but something from us takes. 

Alone, or in the throng, in wake, or sleep. 

Was with his lore, aye, closeted in thought ; 

For but therein his toiling soul found rest. 

Again to him, prepared from llrst to last, 

The ever ready Spirit opened thus : 

"Ere, with unaltered gait, we penetrate 

Where embers glow not for .the murky air : 

That Age's church-yard, where the stifled groans 

From hecatombs of tortured heretics 

Appall the sense ; where we shall shrink, to touch 

The clammy tangibles it offers us, 

And must, without a stay, at random tread. 

It would be pat, if thou didst fortify" 

Thy mental faculties, for well thou koowst, 

Though I elicit them to utmost reach, 

I cannot brace their grasp, which thou canst do 

But through the regimen, of late prescribed 

By physiologists, the same, by whom 

Unbidden guests, yea, all intruders are 

Invited blandly to their lecturing desk, 

So they but say, they come in Moses' name: 



9S MA2S. 

These bid, that thou shouldst phosphorate thy brain 

By eating what the water and the earth 

In richest substance yield, but then, alas ! 

Thy means cannot ascend to dainty food, 

And thy main sustenance must be the kind. 

Wherewith Arabia and Egypt first 

Have blest mankind. O, thou unpractical 

Canst neither speculate, nor realize, 

And being unconverted, never canst 

Convert what thou do'st own into applause ! 

Why be not by thy country's yeomen schooled f 

They have, to fraction of a mill, upon 

The slate of speculation ciphered out 

The worth comparative of corn and iDork, 

And then alacriously convert their grain 

To living flesh and blood, when they perceive 

That the proportion's scale inclines to swine. 

If thou but heed, the counsel speaks itself; " 

It is, that, relatively, thou compute 

The market value of the books thou ownst. 

And then the worth's increase, thy brain will gain 

By being phosphorated with the food. 

The fish and mutton head, to which thou inayst 

Convert thy books. 'Tis strange, that earthly stull" 

Should tlius condition of what property- 

Shall bo that soul of lasting essence deemed ! 

*' Yet, what is there on earth, that is not strange ?" 

The pulpit answers Keason's argument, 

^Vhereas, of all its mysteries, 'tis oue 

The most occult, that, with its unctuous pap 

It crams that spiritual body's mouth. 

But, Tristian, take comfort to thy soul : 

We have, thus iVir, made shift with what thou hast 

From Hea\'eu since thy life's inception owned. 

And with a frugal use, thy iorce, unspent. 

Will yet outlast our conversation's stretch, 

Whose end attained, though, on no richer dish, 

Than his. whose inspiration i)ulsed through pulse, 

Thou mayst not own that DauiePs excellence 

Amongst thy pampered, redigestiug peers, 

And though, unlike him, thou'lt no ^ isions see, 

And tell of what is not, thou shalt at least 

Divine what is, and give thy text such speech, 

That pert interpreter it never need. 

Thus, Spirit cheered, ere on, as is our wont, 

We shall at that first Eesurre(itiou pause, 

Which, by the Writ, has been revciiled to Man, 

True, Time has in her turn, revealed to him, 

That Doom or Kesurrection there was none. 

Whereby thou knowst, as thou knowst life by breath, 



The sole Revealer worthy of thy trust 

Is Time ; learn too, the world, no more no less, 

Than she was then, is nearing to her last. 

Yet with the world, whose end they had premised. 

Survived those charters, to oppress mankind 

With privileges and monopolies, 

Compared to which, all those that wrong thy Age, 

Would earn the name of pnblic benefits. 

What recks the sheep, when shorn, who gets its fleece t 

Still Man is not a lamb, how so he feign, 

For then, there was a wakening, and a wail, 

A gnashing of the teeth, and direful howl 

Of lamentation in that outer dark, 

Xot, as it had been fabled, from the dead, 

Whose gums were emptied by the pull of timts 

And who, of all things, once beyond this life. 

Are not disposed to gnash, lament, and howl ; 

Flit from the living rose the rueful shriek. 

Who, duped by dread of doom, had given all 

To them, whose cunning and cupidity 

Had made their panic fear a welcome sleight. 

To i^ass to tbem, what those would cast away. 

Yet, as a drop to sea, to which it were 

Xot more increase, compared the temporal 

Unto the spiritual woe, v/hich Man 

In his delusion from that fabling took : 

If Evil owned its feigned embodiment 

Of Satan, and he were the origin, 

Not emanation of what's adverse deemed j « 

If he existed in the attributes, 

Which ever have been feigned, in word or thought ; 

And had he been, in person, then installed, 

His coronation never could have been 

More to his hellish liking improvised, 

And it himself had bred the master of 

The ceremonies, than it has been Avrought 

On rhapsody-fanaticised mankind. 

By them, who boasted, that he was undone I 

Y^ea, Tristian, if e'er thou be disposed 

To lay thy mental ear close to the vent 

Of yonder life, then shalt thou aiDprehend, 

How grace crammed souls, yea, some who thither winged 

But yesterday, lament still to themselves, 

That they, on earth, their aspirations quenched, 

And, ail too fain, allowed Delusion still, 

To shroud them from the light, which there beyond 

Now smites upon their unaccustomed sense. 

Why should not Man, who, to fulfill the Word 

Had turned a lamb, to Satan then have owned, 

As loyal subject, his allegiance, 



IQO MAN. 

Since Sheep, are in tlieir patience, most at ease ? 

Yea, fabled Satan ! tliou tbe prototype 

Of ]3oliticians in the IJesli and blood,' 

AVlio are no daintier than thyself, to cronch 

In lowest straits, so they may slime the realm : 

As, erst in Paradise, thou didst contract 

Thy all pervading magnitude, to creep 

in vSerpent's slough, so thou didst not disdain, 

To humor Pope Sylvester, second named. 

By being pegged within a head of brass, 

That through its mouth, thou mightstxn'oclaim him Pope, 

So he, by grace divine, might own thee liege 

Unto his own, immediate subject Hock ! 

This, Satan, was thy master artifice ; 

Yet not by thee, but by a botf:hing imp 

Was that archbishop of Cologne advised, 

When he, to spoil the future emperor. 

The fourth of Henrys, in his tutelage, 

Indulged and urged him in that vile excess 

Which, ruinous at every stage of life. 

Is scathing most to youth. That trick, of late, 

If there be sooth in what the people noise. 

Was, in its repetition, self undone. 

When by that school of Metternich, which thence 

Its cox)y took, it fondly was essayed 

On first ]SI"apoleon's son, whereby they ho])ed, 

To operate upon the womb of time, 

And make it bare of one calamity, 

The^hile that School still hatched a feller kind. 

That son, by nature disinherited. 

Soon in his grave interred those idle fears, 

Whilst Henry, more enlightened than his Age, 

Instead illustrating it in himself, 

But glared like beacon in surrounding dark. 

Yea, smoth'ring gloomy must have been that Age, 

When, in the very church himself had built 

As Emperor, of rulers chief on earth, 

He last must beg, in vain, the menial place 

Of reader to obtain mere nature's needs : 

Yea, erst he did not know, how many do? 

A friend, of common run, clings like a leech : 

When once the blood Is in, the use is out ; 

Whereas, he should be held still in reserve 

Until, of our distempered sap we wish, 

To rid ourselves. Yea, when lie v/anrlered forth, 

An excommunicated and deposed. 

And was beneath, where erst above, he felt 

The sharpest thorn in rank Privation^s hedge 

Is, when a noble mind must condescend 

To level of the vUe, by whom the least, 



MAN-. 101 

Cp to his recreant, forgiven Son, 

He was forsaken, in despair to die 

Of hunger and jirivation on those steps. 

Where his forbidden corpse its burial lacked. 

Yea, Church ! Thus those glad tidings of great joy 

Where through those centuries eclioed by thy deeds ! 

This moment, ibr thou art ignored, thou vrliin'st 

Of persecution, but Humanity 

Has learned to know the genuine too well, 

To be deluded by thy spurious still. 

As, from thy victim, we advert to the(^ 

And seventh Gregory, that potent Pojk', 

'Tis no surprise, that he, wlio conld so tar 

Forget himself, and equal fellow Man, 

That other Henry, as to humble him 

^Tith that indignity, of standing out 

In winter, barefoot, for three days and nights, 

Sliould outrage so far his Creators truth, 

As to decree, no good was veritable. 

Unless stamped current with his signet's seal, 

Xor evil either, save by liim condemned ! 

When Truth is most ignored, then fairest sounds 

The praise of him, by whom 'tis countenanced. 

We've now attained the Crusades, and behold 

The ecstasy of Man's fanaticism ! 

What oft was tried, at last came to appeal : 

The Dispensation and the Moslem creed 

W^ere armed, once more, for final deadly strife, 

For Man had svrorn, one must to other yield ; 

Bnt He above gave the arbitrament, 

That both should stand until their time had come. 

The while, in Godfrey, duke of Bouillon 

Kemark the prototype of those two chiefs, 

Who in Columbia, near each other born,- 

In diverse ages, are its standard names : 

The one in part, the other in the whole, ^ 

Of whom, hereafter, farther in their place. 

The Khine ascending, on that fated Seed, 

Who, fled how far they would, had on their heel 

Fell Persecution, those Crusaders first 

Inured themselves to rapine, havoc, blood; 

And, when upon their march, that Seed gave out, 

Tbeir demon wrath, to be on Moslems wreaked, 

Was fed on harmless lives of their own creed, 

Who, daunted and infuriate with despnir. 

In self undoing direr doom forestalled ! 

As if the horrors in that horrors' sink, 

Jerusalem, like hellish drink in Man, 

Kebellions clamored for more company. 

Again, it was a whirling pool ot blood, 



102 MAN. 

Still gliastlier in the deatVning reek and stench 
Of human bodies burned alive in throngs ! 
That fated holy city, and the land, 
Lont? wrung in blood, 'tween Tarks and Christians 
Staid with the former after they had oft 
Changed worthless ownership 1)etween the two, 
Who," either vanquished or victorious, 
Evoke the Spirit\s equal sympathy : 
What needs, that we retlect upon their woes f 
The sorrow^ is, that Man permitted Hell, 
To simulate, that for the cause of God, 
He should ignore the very Keason, which 
Himself had given, to oppose its wiles. 
To Man, from those (Jrusades, accrued small gain, 
Which little, in the main, is clustered in 
The better knowledge, Man acquired of Man, 
Beside those poems founded on their theme, 
W'hich are, however, like those palaces, 
Whose greatest value, unenhanced by site. 
Was given by their cunning architects. 
The sects, that slivered from the Eock, are fain. 
To leave the rubbish and the stains behind ; 
Let them be honest, and confess the fault, 
For which mankind have long ago atoned, 
And let them own the debt, which long is paid. 
•They must remember, those tabooed Crusades, 
liike all disastrous, ignominious feats 
A\'ere ventured on, and prosecuted through, 
Whilst they were active members of the firm, 
And that it is indecorous in them, 
Like stept out partners trading for themselves, 
To, snickering, divulge the secret aits. 
Manipulated by the ancient house 
To pulse its schemes into the destined port. 
Let them, no more, like hypocrites decry 
That h3ly lance, those visions and pat saints ; 
For she but practised what she erst was taught, 
That Man, deluded, might be goaded on, 
With feller cruelty than those beasts in Spain, 
To demonstrate, how lower than a brute 
Thy kind will sink, when it is reason-wrenched. 
As Man, now in that darkness' counter light, 
Has learned to look upon Jerusalem 
With kindred reverence, in which he holds 
A worthy dame, for whom, in woman's flush, 
Hot blooded youth has fought in mortal strife ; 
So now he's spared the pangs of pious grief. 
That Saladin, the gen'rous minded Turk, 
Instead his peer, hervic Lion-heart, 
Remained the victor of that Holy Land. 



MAy. 103 

middle Age, forever known as dark ! 
Thy Ignorance does vanish fast from Man j 

Thy fell Corruption ye.t worms through his stock : 
Can Man conceive, how wretched is that time 
When, with Stupidity to boot, mankind 
Are ruled by arguments of greater weight- 
In gold ? Yet, he, in office thus defiled. 
Could force that Emperor, surnamed Kedbeard, 
To kiss his very foot, and have his neck 
To bear the impress of his treading on ! 
Well might another, seated on the Kock, 
Be shamed to own the truth, the Sultan wrote, 
That he, a Moslem, better followed Christ 
Than he, his Yicar by his actions proved. 
The controversy, which then occupied 
Both courts and pulpits, whether from or hy 
The Son, the Holy Ghost proceeded, might, 
In present dearth of subjects, be revived. 
As also, whether brother, ancestor 
Or offspring of the Lord's the Holy Ghost, 
To edify the world with doctrine lore. 
Perhaps, the pulpit could illustrate now, 
How it may chance, in genealogy. 
That he, who in descent is number three^ 
Has been the ancestor of number tivo : 
'T would teach an allegory to mankind, 
Which were with such sublime instruction fi-iiught 
To true believers as was Hakeoi's gloss, 
That made his subjects stare, where first they frowned." 
'^ Illustrious Guide, thou knowst, I have no thought, 
Which will not bear the casting into speech, 
And that my mind, however far I press 
Upon thy track, in Specuiatioirs field, 
Still rotates on the wherefore of all things : 
But now, my axis's Ibuled among those stumps. 
Which stand uncleared, and there 1 pray thy help : 

1 mean those sick'ning liosts of slaughtered Man, 
By conquering arms, like as that Genghis Khan 
Undid those human fifteen millions. " 

'• Well may thy progress be arrested by 
That mountain in the horrors' chaiu, which we 
Have in our course of Man so oft traversed. 
And shall again unto our journey's end; 
But deem m)t, for the rude or drowsy hand 
Ot History did uot record llieir (-ause, 
Or scribble it iu characters grotesque, 
Which only at their date weif legible, 
That those disastrous and destructive wars 
Where motive lacking strokes of Accident ; 
For, Tristian, like those in thy own days, 



104 MAN'. 

They were the upshots of their periods, 
And carried that, wherewith their bore was charged. 
There never will be universal peace., 
For as it is with individual Man, 
Who has depreciated from the place 
And rank, he once attained and occupies, 
Be it in office or society, 
So 'tis with nations : but stern Trial's shock 
Can oust them from the station, which they wrong : 
As students in a university. 
In their examination stand or fall, 
As they did strive or loiter in their course. 
And those, who hold themselves aloof, unless 
Firm iu assurance, they could graduate 
At any time, are cancelled on the list ; 
So ever nations, but through war evince, 
How they did cultivate tbeir term of peace. 
One law prevails with insect and with Man, 
And, as migrating vermints, marshalled, cope, 
Subdueing minor species, that oppose ; 
So nations, when their genius expands, 
With violence, on those resisting press! 
ISTeed I enlarge upon the fitness yet, 
That God has thus decreed ? Thyself hast marked, 
In thy own life's events, how meet it is, 
That, as the system of the universe 
Is in that wisdom ruled, which emanates 
From its Creator ; so the peopled earth 
Concedes those nations the pre-eminence, 
Which prove, in their domestic excellence. 
That, for the time, they own that wisdom most. 
How violent this order has been wrenched, 
In thy own countr^^ where a minor race 
—Since for its excellence it culture lacks- 
Has, by the conquerors been interposed, 
To rule, in fact, if not in theory, 
A higher, kindred, tliough a vanquished race. 
Will be evinced in its rebounding crash. 
Unless its havoc force be broke in time. 
I)eem not, the ftising in a greater state 
Of smaller ones, will bare the womb of strife ; 
For, if misrule and wrong obtain, it will 
But shift from stranger to domestic war: 
The exhalations of the main stream's bed 
Are never less, than were its feeding arms' ; 
And though, no midsea wave can strike the shore, 
So wrong yet shrieked, but still the answer rame. 
If not iu same, then sure in future Age." 
^'Omniscient Spirit, yet elucidate. 
And tell me whether there will ever be 



MAN. 105 

The piteous Time, that shall bewail herself, 
Which to conceive, my sickened vision droops : 
When Man, for livin.g- room upon this earth, 
Shall be constrained to havoc on his kind? " 
" Like station looms thy query in our course, 
Inviting us to halt, and pondering rest : 
In those rude times, when Man lived by the chase, 
More than by tillage, in those latitudes, 
Whose most prolific growth is Man himself. 
He was, like younger breed of bees from hive, 
Compelled to swarm, and seek a room for life j 
Hence those invasions of barbarian tribes 
From Europe's, and from Asia's North and East 
Into the former's Centre, South and West. 
As elsewhere marked, that China even now, 
To stay its population's heaving liax. 
Endures pollution m those fated babes. 
Which demonstrates the inhumanity, 
Kin So the infernal in this age's light, 
That Avould the entrance to Columbia's room 
Against their life compelled migration bar. 
Conjecture what were Europe's dire distress. 
If that great light had been extinguished, ere 
It to Columbus had illumed a sphere. 
And thus, the overpopulated md 
Were by the New World's eighty millions thronged, 
Who then were urged, to force a surplus' vent 
Into the other ancient continents ? 
That ignorance deser^ es no countenance, 
Yea scarcely toleration from mankind, 
Thou wilt discover, if thou but reflect, . 
That Science, whereupon she ever wars 
Is the condition precedent to life, 
As man in number grows upon the earth. 
Whereon he, even now, were Famine's prey. 
Did he not know to draw a richer store 
Than she has yielded to his ancestors : 
Were all the arable domain of earth 
Now tilled, Man's Knowledge, in its present state, 
Could scarce make shift, to raise the sustenance 
For fourfold number of the ju'esent Man ; 
Hence Science, the purveyor of mankind 
Must, bustling, still accelerate her pace. 
To keep in the advance of Man's increase 
Which, last, must infinitely, crowd his throng ; 
Hence it is plain, that for new continents. 
Which are uo more — since all the earth's explored — 
A substitute, Man but in Science finds, 
Who, with the aids, she else affords to Man, 
Although unable to make aught of naught, 



106 MAN. 

Can yet conrert Earth's wastes to use for Man, 

And, by diverting Nile's alluvia, 

Give him in that Sahara, what shall be 

As good, as were another continent, 

Sufficient for all Europe's millions. 

Let therefor Science, heeding but herself, 

Be undiverted by the backward plucks 

Of Ignorance, and if it simulate 

A grace from heaven, or a curse from hell, 

For, by the same Creator's Providence, 

That has disposed the plants to turn to light, 

And roots to stretch for soil, Man's genius 

E'ow from theology to science turns, 

And hence the pulpit's wailed sterility. 

Were Man a laggard, IS^ature would herself 

Be Science' self enlisted pioneer. 

As thou hast witnessed on Columbia's plains. 

Where culture's flora she forestalling bore 

In Man's advance, although by lightning sped. 

From this diversion let us now proceed. 

And in that English John at Ruuuyraede 

Behold, how Evil, when it enters Man, 

Although he be the mightest King on earth, 

Still leaves the gate unbolted where it passed, 

xVnd Justice, on its heels, would follow in, 

If Man barred not her way. Deluded Man ! 

How, like a babe, he is beside himself 

With maudlin joy, when of the all he gave 

To Eoyalty, and to ]S^obility, 

The latter from the former wrench a part. 

Which they add to their share ! Yet this he calls 

Concession of a charter to himself ! 

Yea, of concessions get a pittance now. 

As semblance then—in time thou'lt get thy all, 

For knowst thou not, by drops the oceans fills f 

Perhaps the dupe, who has to gamblers lost 

His store of gold, has reason to rejoice, 

And boast of his exploit, as forth he draws 

A bag of coppers, which he pressed from them, 

As much by supplication as by threats ; 

But it would more become the rule of Man, 

Did he compel his rights to be restored, 

Aud enter in such stipulation then. 

That neither part would afterwards have cause, 

To either press the other, or to yield. 

Yea, that mankind, as they attain the lights. 

Forbear to wreak their retribution on 

Tijcir foil deceivers, is the best of proofs, 

That, Verily, they're better in the light. 

Than they, in darkness, from jtheir si)oilers learnt 



MA If, 107 

To hold themselves. Yet^ Man ! still bear with Time ; 

For often she is like that fig-tree cursed 

Out of her season : for not heeding this, 

Like one, who deems it is near breaking day, 

And wakens, yet in night, a sleeping house, 

For doing which, he meets a burglar's doom, 

That Frederick, the second. Emperor 

Discovered, by the forfeit of his crown, 

That he could rule, but never rouse his Age. 

What was it to the Church, that he had won, 

By but the terror of his name, Jerusalem, 

Which to possess, she oft had goaded Man, 

To pour his blood, as it were worth no more 

Than water in the Main f Great Frederick, 

When Excommunication girdled thee, 

The vulture Grief, upon thy leafless trunk, 

Soon built her nest, as thou wast castle pent I 

What boots it to inveigh against thy Age, 

Whose venal, God-forgotten prelates sold 

That holy Eoman Empire to the bids 

Of Cornwall Eichard, and that Castile Prince, 

Whilst in a realm, far larger than that old. 

The main of power, both to give and take, 

Is Bribery and Ignorance derived ? — 

As through that Age's gloomy wilderness 

We, pathless pressing, weary issue now 

Upon the glade, the poet Dante cleared, 

Thou from its terminus, at large, surveyst 

The devious track Humanity pursued. 

As indicated by his notches, cut 

Upon the looming objects in his lore. 

When Tristian that epidemic quelled 

In thine, what never more can be relit. 

And thou wouldst have made question with thy God, 

Thau which, thy patience now is better schooled. 

Thou reckst not, that from thy Creator came 

But feigned inflictions, whilst the real are wrought 

By Man on Man 5 for well remark, that plagues. 

By Mature through her workshop's funnel heaved. 

In their short visits, at long intervals, 

—To test how Man in Science has advanced — 

But with his body pay their travel's charge ; 

Whereas, that Inquisition-pestilence 

Was on his Spirit, for five hundred years. 

Unceasingly inflicted by his kind. 

In woes and horrors, whose corroding thread 

May not be woven in our lasting lore. 

But from this qualmy reek let us escape : 

In time ascending, we too scale the earth, 

Where both her region and Time's period 



108 MAN^. 

More grateful and iuvitiug' bid us ken 

Helvetia, where those brave mountaineers 

Achieved a boon, wnich their i^osterity 

Had the sagacity to keep intact. 

Thou knowst, vhat lightest sails upon rei)()it 

Is shallowest of l)ottoin : thus the gloss, 

That only through her neighbors' jealousy 

Helvetia her independence owns ; 

Whereas, that she preserved her liberty, 

Through all the break and make of restless fniie, 

She owes but to herself, in Iiaviug kei)t 

Her marrow sound, her lieart corruption free. 

'Tis not ad\'isable to prophesy, 

For, who predicts an evil-fraught event. 

Becomes its sponser by his very word, 

And like endorser to a note of hand, 

Is interested that it shall be solved : 

Yet, saving this proviso to my lore, 

Than spreads that freedom's staff on Man's domain, 

There's many a banner Haunts a wider breadth. 

Whose tatters may be into paper wrought. 

Whereon the bard, in quick'ning words shall call 

Upon that nation's Shade to rise again. 

That she may emulate those mountaineers ; 

There's many a freedom's bird shall gorge so long 

Oh carrion, and troop, in taste depraved. 

With buzzards, till himself be deemed bur one. 

Whilst, uncorrui)ted in the Spirit's blue. 

Above those crags, the Alpine eagle scales. 

But let us on, and in that chapel glance. 

Where seventh Henry, German Emperor 

With consecrated wafer sealed his death, 

Wherein thou seest, such spiritual food 

May in the flesh, though not in spirit kill. 

Since it but enters where no spirit dwells, 

For were it there, it would reject the dish 

Instinctively, as Man's assistant brutes 

By their inherited direction shun 

Those weeds, that grow to be escbewed, not chewed. 

Oh Gold ! thy uses' and abuses' sum 

Will be but total with the final All ! 

That thou shouldst ever have been sanctified 

As pander by Pope Benedict, the twelvth, 

To scale that female's zenith of her life. 

Which turned, a maiden either blooms or droi)s 

To woman's lasting honor or disgrace ! ^ 

And yet, the brother with the pander closed. 

Where erst the poet spurned. How fell that Pope 

From him who last had borne his proper name ! 

Yea, wondrous fickle is Saint Peter's chair 



MAN, 109 

As seat of peril or security ! 

The evil Pope plucks with impunity 

The veiling leaf, named from the very tree, 

Whose fruit, with poison stuffed, undoes the good ! 

In doomed Eienzi, one more witness tells, 

Man is as frequent, who can light the torcli, 

As he is rare who has the bearing gift 

To what is ever yearned, but seldom reached, 

And, least of all, in such benighted Age 

As when the veritable Satan ruled 

Incarnate in that sainted Peter's stead, 

Or else, the Constance Council of the Church 

Amiss has designated him it scanned, 

And whom Man knows as John, the twenty third. 

Yea, it is strange — but then, what is not strange ? 

That Man should glorify the triune rule 

In heaven, and, in turn, eschew it here. 

When represented on the adverse side ; 

But then, those antipopes, both true and false, 

Unlike the Trinity above, were not 

In spirit one, although in persons three j 

And though, mankind, that it might be fulfilled. 

As it was written, welcomed more than shunned 

The devil's sway, yet his divided rule. 

In its confusion, fell so far below 

The promise' notch, that it was hustled out. 

By shifting all the three, and fixing one ; 

For, even in the devil's own disputes, 

There wants not Man, to plead the cause of (tO(1, 

Provided only, that it is his own. 

'Twere wondrous too, if not so often done. 

How those considerate Consistories 

Aid the compliant Holy Ghost ; for whilst 

Obsequious, he condescending yields 

His inspiration, unconcerned to whom. 

That he but needs, to breathe as gently as 

His emblematic dove, they light his toil, 

By off'ring one, whose mind has been, beyond 

His rivals, stocked with theologic lore, 

Or its yet better substitute of tact. 

So it but needs. that finish for its fill : 

Thus both the high contracting parts are served ; 

For thus the canvassing Consistories 

Keed look no further than to Italy 

For the material, whence Popes are cast. 

Instead ot being worried with the task 

Of picking it amongst the fishermen 

Of Palestine, or further Christendom ; 

And thus the Ghost need not inhale a blast 

For such a gustful puff, as were required 



no M^.v. 

For the inflation of mere Ignorants.— 

Deem not, that more, than from Sahara, sprung 

Thy blest Civilization from that Eock, 

Which was to it less nurse, than is the crag 

To crowning tree, w^hich for its nourishment 

Yea, very stay, must drive its creeping roots 

Into the disregarded ground beyond. 

What thou of green beholdst upon the Eock 

Sprouts from the soil, which has in layers formed 

From sheddings of Humanity above j 

Xor deem, the Church did share the drowsiness, 

In which she hilled mankind, for but consult 

The sayings of Pope Boniface, the eighth, 

The record also of those fated Popes, 

Who — for their love of Man w^as not absorbed 

All by the Church — as only out of place, 

Were shorn of use, or shifted out of life. 

We with that Orleans Maid will make our halt, 

Till we resume our disquisition next. 

The while thou ponder, what relationship 

Flock tending may with Inspiration boast ; 

And that thou needst not fumble for the thread, 

Whereon to string thy thoughts, I will suggest, 

That thon, for start, return to Horeb Mount. 



MA jy. Ill 



Oi^iSTTO IX. 



CONTENTS 



Dawn of the modern Age. Printing. Dogma and Doctrine. Popes. 
Columbus; other men of Genius. Martin Luther. Intelli- 
gence and Ignorance. Frederick the Great, "Washington and 
Napoleon. 

As in the farthest West, that laud of gold, 

The miuer hoards a pyramid of ore, 

Which, in the crushing and refining, yields 

Him scarce a thimbleful of precious dust ; 

As in the distant East, that land of spice. 

The patient tiller gathers, by the load, 

The roses from his fields, Avhose world sought oil, 

In distillation, drips but drop by drop ; 

So stowed the pupil, in his hold of soul. 

The teacher's pluckings from the stock of Man, 

Content, if what his lore in essence cleared 

W^ere even less proportioned to the bulk. 

Than is that precious metal to the dross, 

Or that enrapturing liquid to the murk. 

And, as those scent and glitter seekers cast 

A ruefnl eye on many a bush and knoll 

They cannot cull, but must leave to the chance 

Of after gleaning ; so too Tristian 

Could scarce to his purveyor bustle up. 

Much less diverge to where he wistful spied 

A tempting cluster, which he fain would pluck, 

When thus his Guide, in steady gait, resumed : 

'^ We in our course of Man have now attained. 

Where so confounded is the light wiih dark, 

'Tvyere hard to judge, if day or night prevailed, 

In what thou well mayst as the twilight hail, 

Were not the comiug by the parting told ; 

But deem that dawn not such, as thou beholdst 

In middle latitudes— where Xight, illeased 

With her unvarying Equality, 

Casts off her mantle in oue twitching Jerk, 

And to the ushered Day no welcome deigns — 



112 MA 11. 

But rather such, as owns that higher clime 

Where like well mannered, frugal housewife, Night 

With heedful, saving hand adjusts her cloak, 

As, fold by fold, it from her shoulders rolls, 

And she long parleys with her coming mate ; 

For though we steadily approach thelight, 

Yet, as a beaten army on retreat, 

— The while its gross in pellmell tumbles on — 

Here, in the scattering fire of motlej' squad, 

There, in the volley of a regiment, 

IS'ow, in the thunder of some cannons' halt, 

Then, in the sabres' clash of cuirassiers 

Upon their haunches braced, the fight maintains. 

The while the smoke and dust, obscuring, pall 

Pursuer and pursued, that none can tell" 

Save either host, which side has won, which lost ; 

So rearward sends that Dark its fitful streaks, 

Which are, at times, so with disaster fraught 

To them, who all too boldly forward push, 

That Man, enveloped in its shrouding murk, 

May often well mistake the going out 

To be the coming in. But take thou heart : 

We henceforth follow in the suit of Man 

With more security, for Guttenberg 

Has with the physical, to light mankind 

A spiritual luminary fixed. 

Which lasting shines, and is to Man indeed, 

What of that bow of Promise was but feigned : 

Assurance, that, he shall endure no more 

The dark, which then he passed, more fell to him 

Than all the floods, which Fabling could conceive ; 

For, 'neath that eye, Man will not dare the deeds 

He would not stickle in the light of day. 

What though, in keeping with those heavenly orbs, 

Along the wholesome plants, it cheers to life 

It must elicit also pois'uous weeds ? 

Man has his judgment, to discriminate. 

And need not taste, what is against his gust. 

Note too, the tune which vibrates through this Age 

In discord is not so monotonous. 

As that, erst wailed in universal qualm, 

For, in the dreary organ of the Church, 

That great Mohamed set a dulcet pipe, 

When, Byzant taken, the free exercise 

Of Christian worship he allowed to faith. 

Let still, what Pope Calixtus third, asserts 

Be sounded through the echoing halls of Time : 

That even one, so steeped in filth and crime, 

That, if he lived, he'd be a nondescript, 

Is by the mere tiara's putting on, 



MAN. 113 

So metainoipliosed by the 'Holy Ghost's 

Illumination, that he's pure and great 

Like God, yea, that he's even God himself! 

For, in the world's great fair, the only booth 

Xo longer is the Eock, nor do its wares 

8uch ready disposition find with Man, 

Since he from his own Eeason counsel takes, 

Ere closing for the glosses, though avouched 

Infallible for earth and heaven both. 

By them, who learnt no other market-cry. 

With votaries — there also must be such — 

Let Paul the second's maxim still obtain. 

That Science and the Church, as enemies. 

The one the other must annihilate : 

As indicated, Man shall quickly know, 

When that alternative is forced on him • 

Which »ne, for sake of life, he shall forsake : 

There's one Eeligion lasts as long as Man, 

And she is Science's tutrix, not her foe ; 

But as for systems'? 'Tis decreed for all, 

That what so springs on earth, to earth returns. 

When Piety the Church's peaus chants. 

Let not her praise be stinted, for her clog 

Against Columbus' genius stood in vain. 

When Man will tread his reason under foot, 

The earth must needs be to a mad-house turned j 

And 'tis no w^onder, for his love of Man 

Savonarola should be racked and burned, 

The while Pope Alexander, named the Sixth, 

And cardinals, with scores of courtezans. 

In Paphian orgies, so defile God's make, 

Not Man, much less the Spirit would relate. 

If Man could but behold its progeny. 

He never would beget the parent crime. 

For every fault still bears its very lash. 

And if too i)otent for Man's chastisements, 

The culprit will devise them 'gainst himself. 

Yea, that Pope Alexander, sacred feigned, 

l^one could so punish, as he did himself ; 

Therefore, O Man ! forgive, though not forget. 

Since he, a monster to his proper self, 

As much as to his kind, yet had the grace, 

To rid the earth of direst enemy, 

When he himself assassinated with " 

The poison he had for an other drugged. 

Be not disgusted with its quelling stench. 

But glance upon his body, stretched by Death- 

Like mangy cur's by poison blown ; as black 

As steeped by Satan in his dye of hell ; 

The venom frothing from his mouth and nose, 



114 MAN. 

Like from that Serpeiit, as the horrid known : 

His tongue outlolling like a bntchered beast's -, 

Then, tremble Man into thy stay of soul, 

For he's thy like, he's human as thyself, 

And, possibly, thou might'St have been like him. 

Yea, dread to think, how low the brute in thee 

Can viciate and dei)rave thee to a tiend ; 

Then, as in horror thou avertst thy eyes, 

Exult within thy bosom's utmost stretch, 

That by thy Spirit, necessarily lodged 

For life in tenement, so i)eril fraught, 

Thou canst be elevated to thy God ! 

Were aught a wonder, ^twere, that still the Church 

Vv'ill take example from the buzzard's feats, 

And vaunting point upon such heaps of filth 

As proof, what in her maw she may digest, 

And yet survive : yea, it is made of rock ; ^ 

Hence let her own that rarest laculty, 

Not only to work off, like wine new pressed, 

All the impurities she has absorbed. 

But all corruption bred within herself. 

Ytt, howsoever she has changed her gust, 

She could not then endure the j)urity 

Of him, who third, was rightly Pius named ; 

Of Adrian, and Urban, both named sixth ; 

Marcel the second ; Innocent the ninth. 

And Leo the eleventh of that name ; 

But in her heaven she could find a niche, 

Wherein to raise Pope Pius named the fifth, 

In whom the world such monster realized. 

As she before had scarce in fable known : 

There let him still in Paris plaster shine. 

Since thou for no such exaltation yearn'st. 

We will not with thai" Council visit Trent, 

Since, what was there decreed concern us naught : 

Why should Man (juestion, if it does him good. 

The bible's and tradition's equal weight. 

The worship of the interceding Saints, 

The adoration of Virginity, 

The wondrous trrnsformation, which is wrought 

In supping dry, without a liquid's drop ? 

Why should protesting Orthodoxy mock 

That sole escape, which Purgatory leaves 

In midway to that hell, which bottom lacks, 

And which to stanch — as if the soul were tow — 

Is but the cause, why most of Man are boru, 

Siuca ingress in that heaven is so rare. 

That it requires a mountain moving faith, 

For Man to venture in their stress of chance, 

Unless, those Creeds dissemble to themselves, 



MAN. 115 

And disbelieve their pious Preacli and Writ ? 

Yea, it is meet, such councils should decree 

Their priests' celibacy, for will that Hearen, 

Which for the cuckoo's progeny has care, 

Have less, for what springs from a sacred cope 1 

And why should miracles no more astound ? 

He, who their perpetration would forbid, 

So long as Man will their credentials take, 

Were worthy that he should believe in them. 

But, verily, does it concern mankind. 

When Councils pit that rock firm ignorance 

With Joshua, and all Inspired to boot, 

Against great Galileo, and all tbose, 

Who spy not Heaven through the Gospel's blind ; 

And then, when in the proof they lose their gage. 

Their chagrin soothe with dungeon and the stake. 

Yet still let Man i)rotect the gods he feigned, 

The One Almighty will avouch Himself. — 

In Man's Civilization's endless Main, 

To sink his craft, Eome mostly stood the Rock, 

Which served most aptly for a sheltVing cave. 

At once of wreckers and of buccaneers ; 

Yet often too, was it the hermit home 

Of Popes, who like that Iburteenth Benedict, 

And fourteenth Clement lighted up their dome, 

To guiding warn mankind from off the reefs 

And shallows, whereupon, as much impelled 

By Time's resistless heave, as heedless steered, 

By giddy brains, that Gallic race was drawn : 

Alas ! discredited by its own Past, 

'Twas then unheeded^ when it cautioned true. 

Yet in thy struggles, Eock ! remember still. 

That never Eome was given thee for site. 

For he, who reared thee, owned no foot of ground. 

And what a Kaiser gave, a King may take. 

As for the rest, since we have dragged the Trnth 

From underneath thy weight, be thou, if not 

The Eock of Ages, still to Ages known ; 

Yea, last with that, which Mount Sorato caps, 

And be still mightier, for all coming time, 

Than is the heaven, which thyself hast feigned : 

Like Man, who showfi to Eiches but his front. 

And ever back to Poverty, we hence 

Shall sheer from thee, and, iiassing, gaze on them, 

AVho in that darkness bore, within their breast, 

The Heaven lighted torch : Columbus ! Peace 

To tl^y intrepid Soul, by Power wronged : 

Eternity accords, what Life denied -, 

For thou to Man, as his purveyor eamest, 

By evolution of His first design, 



116 MAN, 

Not by the draw of fumbling Chance. A^Tiat, though 

Precipitant and injudicious Pros© 

Has, by appropriating, made herself 

That fraud's accessary, when she bestowed, 

As Sponsor, on thy world another's name. 

Because, forsooth, it seemed, more than thy own, 

With t'other Continents unisonous % 

The lasting and immortalizing Muse, 

In even dealing justice, has atoned, * 

In recognizing, by no other name. 

What Heav'n l3estowed, save thine, who bore the gift. 

ISTear him, behold the Shades of Copernic, 

Of Tycho Brahe, Kepler, Galileo, 

Who taught to Man, of what immense a Whole 

His Father had made him the owning Part. 

Beside that galaxy we'll rest our glance 

On them, who by the pencil and the pen 

Imparted to mankind a foretaste of 

That Heaven-, which within their bosoms glowed : 

On Yinci, Eaphael, Correggio ; 

On Titian and on Miehael Angelo ; 

On Tasso, Lope de Yega, Calderon, 

Cervantes, Camoens. Then let us turn 

To Martin Luther, who upon his Age, 

Keforming, poured the full of light he owned. 

And it could bear, for had he brighter shone. 

He would have scorched, where he has cheered in proof. 

And yet no Creed could luminary boast 

Which doled out more, than his reflected light : 

Yea, if his maxim had obtained from first, 

And Man, by Eeason, would have probed his faith, 

How were Earth's woeful record shrunk in bulk ! 

Then, Man had never dared the palming off. 

As God's, those deeds, he shamed to own himself; 

Then had that Eock been never more than stone ; 

And, even in the great Eeformer's time. 

Those Anabaptists would not have been taught, 

In their destruction, that the Martyrs' blood 

Is only then the Church's pregnant seed, 

When planted in the soil of ignorance, . 

Whose arable domain, alas ! for them 

Was all appropriated, and foreclosed 

By other Ci-eeds who — though they owned such stretch. 

As, tilled by Craft, could with that help of grace. 

Have been to profit reaped for centuries — 

AVould yet not alienate a standing nook 

Unto that outcast water loving Creed, 

Thence lodged, like sedge, along the shores of Faith. 

The Moslems too, as if they had been roused 

By emulation's goad, have hankered oft, 



MAy. 117 

To rival Christians ia faaaticism. 

They also have discovered in their day, 

That time alone, not blood, can arbitrate. 

Which is the better : prayer or good works. 

Yet whether, with Man's blood— to crush his mind 

In orthodoxy's mould— their massacres 

Outswelled the streams, that gushed from Christians, 

The Spirit will not with his i^lummct sound. 

How different Creeds have in all ages served 

As bloody shuttle, in the weaving of 

Both toreign and domestic politics, 

Thou art apprized, by that dread, goary braid 

That borders in the stretcli of history ; 

But never was it thrown more dextrously 

Than in the hands of French diplomacy. 

Which of Mahomet's warp, and Luther's woof. 

Could weave the robe for that most Catholic 

And Church's eldest son, the King' of France. 

It now is thrown into the lumberloft, ^ » 

By all the governments in Christendom ; 

Thou knowst, how late that Eussian Nicholas, 

When he produced it to the light once more 

Against the Moslems, quick was hooted back, 

By all the world, who by the obsolete, 

Transparent feint no more would be deceived. 

Yet there is One, who fain would ply it still. 

For bis, alas ! have learned no other craft ; 

Yet even from their hand, it now is thrown 

But ineffectual : it twines no more. 

For now into the shallows of Man's faith, 

That stream, whose source was struck by Levi's Sons, 

Has been diverted by Humanity, 

And Man no longer, either ibrced, or prone, 

Xow seeks his destined, everlasting port. 

Upon a channel of his brethren's blood. 

Think, Man ! to whom and what thy thanks are due, 

T^at thither thou canst choose, what road thou wilt. 

Or jog thy own, if none of offered suit, 

Since all but lead to thy Creator back. 

Yea, Tristian, we in our course have reached 

That bourn, forever blest ! that happy Age ;• 

When Man, of his instalments, paid the last 

Of that stupendous debt, he had assumed 

In Dispensation's purchase. It were now 

All bootless to cast up, and ascertain. 

If for the price they paid, maiddnd obtained, 

In Dispensation an equivalent. 

Since now the purchase cannot be annulled. • 

Perhaps, if not before, mankind will make 

Comparison, when next they would acquire. 



11« MAJ^. 

SuflSce, that now they full acquittance hold, 

And if they still incline to everpay, 

Who would restrain their prodigality ? 

Perhaps thou wilt object : '' What gained mankind. 

In casting bigotry for tolerance ^ 

The massacre of Saint Bartholomew 

Is but exchanged, for that of barricades. " 

'Tis true, the very sud, which from its nest 

The squirrel charms, uncoils the serpent too ; 

The tiger also couples in that spring, 

Which heats the fulsome hare, and on one spot, 

The wholesome juniper with fungus grows. 

The bella donua, where the herb beneath : 

In brief, there poison and rapacity 

Are rankest in the stem and bone, where earth 

Is most prolific iu the good she yields -, 

The deepest valleys ajso there decline, 

Where highest mountains loom ; so densest dark 

Alternates tyhere, where flashes brightest light j 

And whilst the oil, that from earth's bosom welled. 

Illuminates our present conference, 

It flames destruction, like a fiend from hell, 

Upon the monuments of modern Art. 

Yet thou hast seen, paraded through the streets, 

That striped terror of the Orient, 

As docile as a kennelled mastiff dog ; 

Thou, in amazement, hast on serpents stared, 

— Which, either with their wiry sinews crush. 

Or strike to certain death, with A'enomed fangs — 

Upon their charmers' limbs so harmless coiled, 

As they were eels in hand of fisherman. 

That electricity, which, in the clouds. 

Is forged into the crashing lightning-bolt, 

Behold, how willingly 'tis chained with wire, 

To" bear thy message as alacriously. 

As 'tv/ere a mandate from its God Himself. 

Yet of the universe, mankind alone 

Should own such passions, and such essences, 

As are beyond the reach of daunting Man '? 

But oust from thee this fear of Ignorance, 

For not thy fi iends, thy foes assure thee thus, 

That they, secure, may raven down their spoil. 

Thus, as in vill, v.hich liom the highway lies, 

The children flee the stranger meeting them, 

Whilst, in the city, they not notice him ; 

So Ignorance mistakes the good for ill. 

Whilst Knowledge seeming Evil will convert 

To better use, than seeming Good would vield, 

When crushed by blundering Stupidity. ' 

Yea, Ignorance in Eden loses Man, 



MAN. 119 

Whilst kuowled^e in Sahara wins the world. 
When once Intelligence prevails with Man. 
Then Might shall never press, save where it ought, 
And none so poor, but he shall have some home. 
For know, O Man ! what has been true from first. 
Will be to last, that of all governments, 
Regardless of their form, but that is fit, 
Where, by its system, every Man inclines 
Into that station in the commonwealth, 
For which he is inherently designed ; 
For if yond spheres from out their orbits rolled. 
This universe were into chaos thrown. 
Where Worthlessness is to the front advanced, 
Man's Merit needs must sicken in the near. 
It is the violation of this rule, 
Which heaves a nation into civil throes, 
For Man must still design his government 
Upon the pattern, Heaven set to him 
In all its creatures, in the elements ; 
There Man sees order : every species fares 
According to its givei^ qualities 5 
There usurpation, by the lower grade. 
Can never shift the higher from their sphere, 
But due obeysance is instinctively 
Accorded by the lesser to the more, 
Who, in their turn, forbear to vex the weak. 
But let them, in their Avay, pursue their bent. 
Let Man adopt this order for himself. 
And then leave to Humanity the care 
Ot weaning him" from his brutality. 
When, after, no more than in animals' 
Shall, in his realm, be known conspiracies, 
Disturbance, civil war, rebellion ; 
And though, no time sball ever know mankind 
Confederate in one, yet Man to self 
Shall do the justice, that he relegate 
His Eulers, be they such by choice or birth. 
To draw their human war material 
But from the willing, not unwilling kind, 
Both ^r offensive and defensive strife. 
Since, by his nature, Man for government 
And nationality will sacrifice 
Himself precisely to that extent, 
Which either, in its worth, deserves of him. 
As we have issued from Antiquity 
. Upon the threshold of thy proper Age, 
Like entering a city, we remark, 
Among its looming monuments, these three 
Located in the memory of Man, 
Who, most of heroes, instrumental were 



120 MAJSr, 

In giving to this Age, the cast it bearw. 

Behold the first in time : As drink two men 

Pnt of one spring, wherefrom one parts refreshed, 

And, with like benefit, still plies the dranght, 

AVhilst in the other, by the shock provoked, 

The pois'nons humors into fever break ; 

So from that modern philosophic stream 

Imbibed that hero, Frederick the Great 

His spirit's recreation, whilst the French 

Were phrensied by the brain arousing draught. 

In probity and punctuality ; 

In education and in tolerauce, 

He through their consequent intelligence 

Has disciplined his people to that growth, 

Which, aided by a hardy aptitude, 

Soon ousted from their stock the baneful slip, 

Himself, mistaken, did inoculate, 

Although, not in his time, the symptoms showed 

Of what it after in disasters bore : 

AVhat marvel, that the Spirit of the French 

Its bastard in the Germans then subdued ? 

The hero stands, without a peer, in that. 

With scantest means, he wrought to fullest end. 

jSTo pageant were his conquests, as are those, 

Wherein most victors grant their countries but 

Precarious tenure, or a life estate, 

Which, on their death, relapses where acliieved, 

But permanently he enlarged his land 

To twice its size, and left, Instead a debt 

To press, a purse to buoy liis people's toil, 

But, most of all, that training, which has been 

So teeming to the world's astonishment : 

Thus, like a glass, the Present magnifies 

His own achievements, glorious in themselves. 

The other thou wilt know in Washington : 

Not he, nor ever hero yet, who lit' 

The tiame of freedom, for it flashed from ersL 5 

Kor he the first, who bore it on the earth, 

For thousands have done so, and will again ; 

But he achieved far more, in that he taught 

How it may further, and not scathe mankind, 

And how a people through the crash of war, 

And stunuings of defeat, may yet be, like 

An infant from its burning cradle, borne y 

For, as his soul, when by disaster struck, 

Was but illumed, not shattered in the dark -, 

So, when last borne upon fruition's heave. 

He moved but with his own impelling force. 

Thou, rightly Father of thy Country named ! 

Thy mettle gave to freedom's sword an edge, 



MAN, 121 

And still thou leadst, but art now followed wliere ! 

Thy deeds are to tby soul a crystal case, 

That shows the contents to the studying mind, 

And still thy country, great beyond thy dreams, 

From log.school to the university, 

Is with thy virtues' teachings redolent, 

For they're fast rooted to the growing tongue j 

But what inseparable from thy soul, 

As breath from life, made thee a demigod : 

Thy rectitude and conscientiousness. 

Where are these lacked, save there, where most in need? 

The third behold in great iSTapoleon, 

Who through the gamut of Man's criticism 

Is tugged and tossed : now heaven's peans' thrill 

Is deemed for praise to low, and now for blame 

Too high the blast of hell, to win, or wean 

The prejudice and bias of mankind, 

Concerning what that hero, and that heave 

Of revolution, teeming with its own. 

As pregnant with his might, have wrought to Man. 

As well might Man condemn, or for all that, 

Aijplaud the thunderstorm of yesterday, 

Which is as like, to be succeeded now. 

By one as fell, to mock him even whilst 

He rails or lands, as that he overween, 

By commendation or disparagement. 

To alter what is past, or to prevent. 

Or further what the womb of time conceived : 

If good and evil were to live, or die. 

By approbation, and by reprimand, 

Mankind could long ago have spared their tongues, 

For they were labelled from the very first. 

And will continue, as earth's counterwheels 

In their designed, antagonistic roll, 

To move mankind, through all eternity ; 

But Man can care— 'twere ill could he do more — 

That still the good shall be the moving cog. 

Both slave and hero, when indulged, but deem : 

" First care to have, the right comes in its train. " 

And not the greatness of Napoleon 

Exacted more of what he owned, than in. 

Their littleness, mankind on him bestowed. 

When Man could scarcely say, he owned himself. 

The earth was cheap through her misgovernment, 

And yielded, with herself, her strength to him, 

Who had the gust and faculty to take ; 

For in the strife between the mass and one, 

The rule will hold, until all struggling cease : 

Ten individual Pompeys cannot cope 

With single Caesar, though but two in one 



122 MAN. 

Consolidated, were his overmatch. 

Rude minds gape on such hero, as they would 

Upon some miracle, whereas, he is, 

Within the scope of Man, as fitly placed, 

As is the mountain in its stretchinfi: chain. 

Thou marvelst, how that hero blundered on 

To that catastrophe in Russia '? 

Thou needfit no clock, to time a hero's course ; 

His shadow's stretch is his chronometer ; 

For know, that he did enter that campaign, 

Without his chief of staff, whom he forgot 

In Swedish Charles, the twelfth's, experience ; 

Since, from the past of nations, as of Man 

He, by near guessing, might have well foreknown 

The Russians' shifts, for though the Spirit's vast 

Teems ever with originality. 

Yet nations, like the individual Man, 

Instead of grasping from its boundless fill, 

Prefer the easier reach to imitate 

Their own, or other people's first success. 

How fair the reason, that the Pfist had borne 

Another Now, there is a better still, 

Why it eventuated as it did ; 

And bootless 'tis, for our discourse of Man, 

That hypothetically we suggest : 

Had this been then, how would the Present be f 

Since all the actual fabric, which the Past 

Transmitted to this living Age for use, 

Is such an endless stretch, as never soul 

May live the time, to scan^ much less to con 5 

Yet since it runs to mind, we will suppose, 

jSTapoleon had instead, with greediness 

Of in^egnant dame, and injudiciousness 

Of nibbling child— who in green fruit will eat 

The kernel death — sedate, like ancient sage. 

In Elba tarried, but one half the years, 

He scarcely could contain himself in months. 

And had in Europe patly reappeared, 

When nations, of their liberation's fruit, 

Were retching on the murk allotted, whilst 

Their dynasties and aristocracies 

Obliviously revelled in the must. 

How would the quarrel, then renewed, have stood ? 

But no philosopher, nor prophet he: 

The fifty years, to his prediction giv'n. 

Are past, and what, had it been realized ? 

Sure, Liberty, and what thereto pertains, 

Are from republics not inseparable, 

Ko more, than is the liquid from the cup, 

Wherein 'tis held. That nation is but duped, 



MAN. 123 

"Which makes the form of government the end, 

Instead the means, of utmost happiness : 

Of all alternatives, the Cossack rule 

Has never been the worst, and much less now, 

Since it bas given freedom to its serfs, 

And its abuse is in the Autocrat, 

^o more assassination limited. 



124 • MAN, 



OA.NTO X. 



CONTEND 



The present Age. Poland and the Turks. Austria : Metternich's 
Policy. England : her Church and Poets. France, Italy and 
Germany : their Present and Future. 

As with a well stocked purse, tli'exultant youth 

From foreign laud, or with diploma from 

Domestic, distant university, 

His pace accelerates^ as nearing home, 

Upon his heart the church's steeple first, 

And then the schoolhouse' turret loom in sight, 

Whilst OD his breast, the native lanscape swims, 

And he in soul the opened heaven clasps, 

IsTow greeting, with a kiss, the very stones, 

Mute confidants of Hope's still muter dreams, 

As thrills within : it all is realized ! 

Then onward flies, with arms instinctive stretched, 

To owning i^ress his prize upon his breast ; 

His childhood's playmate, now the village queen 5 

So Tristian, in his ecstatic soul, 

Approached the purlieus of his living time. 

When, as his wont, the spirit thus resumed : 

^' Ere to the Cemetery of the Past, 

We bid farewell, amongst its nations' tombs, 

Our lore's devoir is to the latest due, 

Whose epitaph's the song of sympathy : 

Yea, Poland ! as thou wast among the last, 

To be evangelized, so thou the first, 

To grant the boon of tolerance to Man, 

Whilst he endured the stake, as heretic. 

In lands, that boasted to be freedom's ark. 

In Sobieski, thou gavest Christendom 

A hero, than a greater it had none 5 

For thou too wast, of nations, fabled blest ; 

Yet, bond of ]S^ature, surest thou of all ! 

When thy own hour of tribulation struck. 

And signalled to those Christian Powers : ^ Seize.' 

Thy cry for rescue struck the instinct ear 



MAir. 125 

Of but those Moslems, erst the yanquished foes, 

Who now, in common dread of kindred fate, 

With thee made common cause, while Creed was deaf, 

To even gratitude, for what thou didst. 

Yea, better merit'dst thou from stranger Man, 

Than what thou compensatedst to thyself. 

If there be aught, however small relief, 

In fellow misery, then be it thine, 

Since now thy woe, for hundred years unshared, 

No more's peculiar to but thyself. 

And other bosoms also shrink to breathe: 

Our nationality is not yet lost ! 

For fear the very wind repeat that scoff, 

Whose hurt no soul may know, save that which felt. 

But then alas ! how can a nation live. 

Who, in herself, is dead to her own stay ? 

Who, blind in overweening ignorance, 

Is self sufficient in her deadly wrong ! 

Yea, that fell veto-bane, and bribery. 

Worm like devoured the marrow in thy stock. 

And only left behind Corruption's filth, 

Which threw thy body in that fever state. 

From which thou mightst have yet arisen cured. 

Had not thy guardians, by thy ibes suborned, 

Admmistered to thy undoing most, 

In bidding them, to strangle, hack and pill 

The patient fallen to their sacred care ! 

Y'et through Man's pity breaks the sullen truth ; 

No nation ever fell by accident, 

Nor has there yet been one, though seeming dead, 

But she revived to her own merit's call ; 

For matter never can subdue the soul, 

And where the Spirit, soon its body forms. 

The fish that snaps, and feasts upon the worm 

Is by its kindred, in its turn, devoured.— 

Since deed suggests the actors, from the dead 

Unto the living nations, be our bridge 

Among the victim's spoilers, Austria, 

Since she but people, but no nation owns. 

Yea thou ! that ever obstinately war'dst 

Against the living Spirit— Once defunct. 

Thou too Shalt own remembrance on the earth ; 

But it will be among thy quarreling heirs. 

And them, whom thy descent, into their tombs, 

Shall therefrom to their resurrection wake ; 

For, unlamented by the living tongue, 

None but the middle Age's fallen jaws 

Shall mumble to the world thy requiems, 

As incoherent, as an idiot's wail. 

And yet, a richer opportunity 



126 MA 2^. 

Xo coimtry ever, than thyself has owned, 

To be eternized in the love of Man ! 

How long hast thou not owned Germania, • 

Who, to the outside world, was passed thy spouse, 

But was, at home, degraded worse than drudge ; 

In her best aspirations hindered, ^ramped. 

And i3ersecuted in her intellect '? 

Nor yet lack'dst thou a factor for thy weal, 

For still thy second Joseph, Emperor, 

Wooed, with a lover's ardor, for thy good. 

Xaught could be tendered more, than he proposed : 

The abolition of all feudalism, 

The fixing of equality in Faith 

And the adoption of a cultured tongue 

Wherein to dress his country's genius ; 

But thy frustrating Spirit interposed. 

That t-was too soon, and soon it was too late ! 

While thou wast prodigal in ignorance, 

A rival, frugal in intelligence. 

Arose against thee in Borussia ; 

And yet, O patient Teuton trustiness ! 

When he proposed, he was repulsed by her. 

Who struggled, like domestic cat attached. 

Against her shifting, whence she was abused ! 

The sequel, Austria, thou but knowst too well. 

For now thou sendst it with thy messenger, 

To compliment the German emperor ! 

Yet heed thou this, for thou art not past cure : 

xVs mercury corrodes the human bulk 5 

So Craft worms through a country's stamina, 

And as the subtile mineral substitutes. 

For temporary ail, a chronic ache. 

Which Science only, with the help of time. 

May haply from the withered body purge ; 

So Craft, inoculated in a State, 

But temporizing with the ills it soothes. 

Entails on it those lingering complaints. 

Which only candid Statesmanship can cure, 

Assisted by the people's innate strength. 

Thus, part, to ward the dangers, which he feigned, 

And, part, to pamper his own vanity. 

Thy Metternich, dubbed by a thoughtless world 

The most consummate Statesman of his age. 

In imitation of those fashion queens. 

Who, for their sway, resort to arsenic. 

Administered to thee his rankling bane. 

That he might boast to Europe i Lo, behold ! 

In the boquet of my diplomacy, 

So grateful to aristocratic sense, 

My Austriais the centre-liower still ! 



MA W. 12^ 

The fair'st in life, are foulest in decay : 

Another summer brings another bloom, 

And thou well knowst, thy present is but weeds. 

Yea, there was never need, thou shouldst forbid 

Thy praise from subjects : States, that so incline, 

Already are no more commendable ; 

And Learning, driven during peace from home, 

Will from abroad return, in time of war. 

But let thy' Emperor still x^ersevere, 

And he will yet regenerate his State. 

Yea, if the Rock, in undisputed rule. 

Could keep all lands in equal backwardness. 

He might adopt its policy, and let 

It further, still, the mass's ignorance. 

And the oppression by the few, that it. 

As erst, might be the pander 'tween the two ! 

But since this is not so, and Oxenstiern's 

Curt precept to his son's but valid then, 

When all the States are by no wisdom ruled, 

Let him, as he would his own palace close 

Against the pestilence, still shut the door 

Of Cabinet and College 'gainst the Rock ; 

And of unfitness purge bureaucracy. 

The pampered fondling of that minister ; 

Let him crop down the sap absorbing shoots 

Of rank Mobility, and graft instead 

The Spirit's fertile scious ; lor the rest, 

The stock will cure itself, for though composed 

Of diverse trunks, it innately is sound. 

Let him concede, wherever they may come, 

To all demands, save those of Ignorance, 

And Austria regains her pristine flush. — 

With knowledge, that a stall, well groomed, will soon 

Show purer than a chamber, roofed with stars, 

When of its filth unbesomed, and unaired. 

We, in our course of Man, now come to thee, 

Oh merry Albion, blessed in that King, 

Who, for the getting of his second wife, 

Became adoptive father of thy Church ! 

Thou Land, where Grace abides personified, 

And scores of Lords devout, to namesake pray ; 

Let not tby freemen, lay and clergy both. 

When proud tney give their reasons for their faith. 

Forget — since 'tis its due in rank of time — 

To name as first, its origiu in love, 

Since, had not been that royal sting of— well. 

Still be it by the name of conscience known. 

Their Anglican, high Church were yet unborn, 

And they, unslivered from the Rock, were still 

Those slaves of Rome they so abominate. 



128 MAN, 

Yet, Albion ! liadst tlioii still owned the Eock, 

It would hav'e tauglit tliee more humanity, 

Thau to have smirched, Avith that soul sick'ning blotch, 

This generous Age's cheek, when thou, of lands 

The wealthiest on the globe, deniedst to dole. 

In stress of Charity, a pittance of 

The sustenance, thou from thy sister wrongMst, 

From that dependent, poor Hibernia, 

When doomed, and helpless she endured, to have 

Her children clinched by famine, nay, thou God ! 

When thousands of them daily starved to death ! 

Yea, Charity's immortal, else she would, 

In thy forbidding selfishness, have died. 

But 'tis no wonder, since thy ethics thou 

Eeceiv'st most through a Church, which, in the main. 

Is but an imitation of the Eock, 

And that a base one, since but few approach, 

Who are not heart chilled by the ice block's freeze : 

l"et may she last, as if on ]S"orth-Pole fixed. 

Still growing in her temporalities. 

And may she ever go, where Wealth refined, 

Politest invitation sends : 'tis meet. 

Her heaven's gate should readiest open swing, 

To those, initiated to its joys, 

By having had their fill in body here. 

Let her, still louder than before, inveigh 

Against the Pope's infallibility : 

Is't more absurd, than is in England's law, 

The fiction, that the wearer ot its crown. 

Who also, in its church, stands for the head. 

Can do no wrong ? Is't more preposterous, 

Than was thy friend, Napoleon's subterfuge. 

That France might put him in, but never out '? — 

Enough of Church! We relish not that Sting, 

More than the savor of its mammon breath ; 

Xor care to ken, how souls were juggled with 

By those base parliaments, whose yeas and nays 

Would raise, or level, any road to God, 

So it but led to royal patronage : 

Sure they're omnipotent, for, since they fix 

For thee the laws of God, can they not too 

Suspend them for— a duke's convenience ! 

Let still all countries grant thee privilege. 

To drumbeat for recruits around the globe. 

But for the future, take this warning now : 

The Spirit, for that nation, in advance. 

The traitor's brand affixes to the brow, 

Of, be he emperor, or minister, 

A noble, or a commoner, who 'gainst 

Thy merchants' gold, will score his country's blood. 



MA]^. 129 

When tlioii and he would in alliance mate. 

Yet Albion^ as mankind thy pulpit shun, 

80 are they ever to thy closet drawn, 

To meet thee in devotion to thy Muse : 

Great Sliakespeare, Pet of Fancy, Heaven sired I 

Immortal thou to Memory of Man, 

For thou wroughtst from* the everlasting store, 

And, as thou drewst from Nature, and from Man. 

Thy faithful copies will be recognized, 

By Man and Kature, while they last to feel^ 

Yet be not rash to deem, that thou mightst vie 

In thy creating with the Deity, 

For but bethink, that thou wast made by Him, 

And thou couldst never make thy other like. 

To Tristian too, as dear that proper name, 

As, in the common, 'tis indifferent, 

Of him, who speaks the raven's sober sense, 

In voice melodious as the nightingale's : 

He, who, in noble effort, Man essayed, 

And who, however be his fancy ranked, 

Will ever live, a prince in authorship. 

Whilst Spirit vibrates 'tween its cheer and gloom, 

Man lists that swallow^, on the dome of life, 

Who owned his cradle everywhere on earth, 

Save where it stood, and who, in dread, atoned 

For more transgressions, than his life had known : 

Yea, they'll insinuate, and damning charge, 

Who cannot know, that he but feels the pang 

Of malefactors, who's incapable 

Of soul, to ever perpetrate the crime. 

Thou too rever'ert that earnest, blind, old bard, 

The more, since not from him, thou tookst that Sting, 

J^or hadst it driven deeper in thy soul, 

Howbeit, from the loss of Paradise, 

He owns more glory, than from its regain. 

And there is but that doubtful love between 

His heaven and Olympus, as exists 

Between the lender and the borrower. — 

Thou rueful France ! 'Tis from the Spirit far, 

That he, with Man, should triumph over Man, 

And to accuse thee, where thou hast atoned, 

Where fiendish, as the frenzy thou'st endured : 

Yea, thou hast on thyself a vengeance wreaked, 

For which the stranger w^ere too merciful ; 

Yet, all thy punishment has been in vain, 

If from it thou wilt no correction take ; 

Yea, heed, for as by instinct, even now 

Thou prickst thy ears again, to catch afar 

The echo of thy syren wether-bell ! 

Woe hangs o'er them, who still, oblivious, tramp 



130 MAN. 

In that civilizatiou, which thou ledst ; 

But thee worse shall befall, than thou'st endured, 

If thou again embrace, what still thou ruest. 

What though, thou yesterday, wast in the wroug? 

To-day, thou canst be right, if thou. so choose ; 

If of illusion thou'lt divert thyself, 

And once, forever, cast thy vaunting i)hrase. 

Whose emptiness thou ever fillst with blood. 

But dress thee in the Spirit's seriousness. 

And pass with him thy troubles, in review : 

Thy tirst of revolutions overwhelmed 

Thee with monstrosities, as afterwards. 

The stranger nations with its prodigies : 

Thy second from their rest those people roused. 

Who by the first's recoil Avere lowest cast ; 

But now, thy third has all judicious warned. 

To halt, reflecting, ere they headlong plunge 

Into that dread abyss, wherein thou howl'dst. 

And which thy pitied children have escaped, 

But through that direful stress, wherein are two. 

Who, wrecked upon a plank, that bears not both. 

The one the other slays, to save his life. 

Kemember, France ! and lay it to thy heart. 

Thy phrases can undo none but thyself j 

For, whilst th'erratic orbit of thy star, 

By Man was studied, he has happ'ly spied 

Another firmly fixed : Intelligence. 

Know, though thou hast forgot, the world has not, 

Thou, too, becamest one of the holy ones, 

And wast constrained, to swallow thy own words. 

When thou, in Spain, against thy better self. 

Wast basely used, with hundred thousand arms. 

To help tramp out that seed, thou ever vauntst 

Thy nursery alone could propagate 1 

In this, behold thy retribntion, France : 

It was that Spaii., from w^hich thy deadly Lie, 

On thee recoiling, 'mongst its kindred burst. 

Which shattered thee into thy elements. 

Thou griev'st the Spirit, and he'll mourn for thee. 

When long, in thy oblivious levity, 

Thou'lt be relapsed again. The havoc, which 

Thou wreak'dst upon thyself, as 'twere thy doom, 

Has staggered Man, so he mistrusts his state. 

As 'tis thus horror mirrored in his kind, 

And where there is a heart, it prayed within, 

That thou mightst find a savior in thy stress : 

Thou sympathetic Chord ! too late thou soundst : 

Kot when the harvest is to market borne. 

Can its defects, inherent in the seed, 

Or brought on by wrong tilling, be repaired. 



MAN. 131 

Yea, help's precarious : scarce will it avail, 

To cloud ward point, upou a mansion's roof, 

The charming magnet, to abduct their bolts. 

When they already crash upou the earth : 

Yet France, while fiercest raged thy crazy storm. 

He, who sat in thy loft, could have affixed 

That death averting lure, had he but Avilled. 

Yea, Tristian, had thy like been in his stead, 

jSTot human nature had been demouized, 

To ply those horrors, Man would fain disown. 

Though frail that country's stay, which Avould depend 

On single Man, whose thread is quickly cut, 

Still be in foreign, or domestic war, " * 

The hero welcome, as a demi-god : 

Yet, France, with other nations know, that most 

In peace, thou needst the saving genius 5 

For greater is the profit, to prevent. 

Than quell disease, though no physician yet, 

Has, by preserving health, acquired a name. 

No need to ask, how hang the Mischief's scales 

Between those Communists and Versaillists : 

France suffered it, and now may take her ease 

In that, the hapijiest far of all the calms : 

The one which on disastrous storm succeeds ; 

Yet by its memory, France be thou adjured : 

As certain as the water, that has i) urged 

Thy Paris' gutters, pooled with human blood. 

Again, has through the clouds returned to earth ; 

So sure, that blood exhaled, will visit thee, 

Directed bj^ the very God, who guides 

The swallows home from the antipodes. 

Unless thou wilt the Spirit's warning heed. 

As Man will never be an angel all. 

So, at all times, no Man has been a fiend ; 

And there's no need enquiring, why it is, 

That Man ignites upon the sunny Seine, 

Idealizes on the castled Ehine, 

Philosophizes on the sandy Spree, 

And realizes on the turbid Thames ; 

For, as yond orbs, without an atom's waste. 

Draw uj) the humors, they evolve from earth, 

And fuse through air, their scattered elements, 

Into such missiles, as their essence yields 5 

So, as a nation, in her heaven, wills 

Her lights to be, shall be the qualities, 

Which they elicit and distil beyond. 

To bless, or blast that nation in return. 

Thy center orb has been the dazzling Lie, 

From which all others took their baleful glare : 

TTnsphere it, France, and substitute the Truth I 



1^^ MAN. 

And with the wholesome sheen, ^twill cast upon 

Thy love of honor^ glory, liberty, 

It will develop candor, honesty 

Self-knowledge, confidence, sincerity 

And conscientiousness : their all in one, 

In thy society, and government, 

Which latter shall reflect on thee the like. 

Then thou, no more, shalt own an emperor. 

Who self-undone by Perjury's recoil, 

Will whine the prostrate desperado's wail, 

That he had basely been betrayed by I'ate ! 

Yea, when thou knowst no more Delusion's goal, 

Thou'lt not be crazed, when 'tis not realized ; 

Tnen in an even dealing rectitude, 

Thy of&ce holders, and thy clergymen 

Will shame to reap beyond their labor's due, 

But understand, they own no sinecures, 

And that, to govern, is an onerous charge ; 

Then with the ire, the flow of blood shall cease. 

And with the lapse of spoiler and of dupe, 

That communism's nonsense falls defunct. — 

The Spirit gratulates thee, Italy ! 

That now, at last, that goading tantalism 

Is at an end, and thou hast realized 

Regeneration, to thy utmost hopes. 

What thou'st endured in those insensate reigns. 

Which but, like apes, for their diversion toyed 

With thy undoing, is to the Spirit known : 

Most arduous thy struggle for the light. 

For of thyself, that cavern had been made, 

W^here thou wast bidden to abide content. 

By them, on Avhom its darkness fell relieved 

By other light, which in their distance poured : 

As to the country, summer tourists flock, 

And in a week's disport, demoralize 

The simple natives there, where lasting stay 

Themselves would deem the worst of punishments ; 

So bend the Catholics their wonted souls 

TJi)on that Eock, but piously ignore 

That it has crushed thy breast 'twas founded on, 

And when thou restive heav'dst, to cast it oft* 

They'd fain have bribed thee with their Peter's pence ! 

Yet, Italy, remember, though thyself 

Art for thy patient sufferance, well worth 

The acquisitions, which thou now enjoy st, 

Yet, somewhat, have they been advanced to thee. 

Probation like, and thou must yet attain, 

Through future merit, to full ownership.— 

Germania, hail to thee, Fatherland ! 

Thine are the laurels of victorious Trutli : 



MAJi. 

As by the wayside stands a tree in spring, 

In blossom fair to view, which nearer seen 

Affliction tokens in its mildewed leaves, 

So bloomed the independence, thou achiev'dst, 

By the prostration of Kapoleon, 

In splendor only of thy fovored few. 

Whilst in their blighted hopes, thy people drooped. 

Man marvelled, how it could be possible, 

Thy stock should flourish with its blasted leaves? 

Yet thus, unnaturally, 'twas decreed 

By that Alliance, aptly holy dubbed, 

Which tricked the earth as "^Eden for the few, 

But bade thy mass, if they'd be blest therein, 

To seek it in their hopes, beyond the grave ! 

Yet though those Congresses were plenar3^ 

They were not full, for there was lacking still 

The Spirit, who has never yet been duped, 

To ratify, what they agreed upon ; 

But weaving on his silent loom of Time, 

He recked not, whether the contractors were 

Mere temp'ral princes, kings and emperors. 

Or holy nuncios from the Kock of Eome, 

And whether they had chartered their own wrong. 

In treaties 'mongst themselves or with the Church. 

When in that Eulers' epidemic fraud, 

Thy princes had the imbecility. 

To fall off from the pledges they had made 

Their people in the utmost stress of war, 

Then, Tristian, only with that noble old 

Bavarian, possessed thy native land's 

Illustrious house — the more commendable, 

For 'twas itself in power circumscribed — 

The inborn honesty and manliness. 

To give a body to its promise' garb. 

Yet there's no need, that we review thy plight, 

SiDce thou, Germania, madest of it thy school. 

And now thy sovereigns have learned, at last. 

If not from own, then from their subjects' proof. 

That he is strongest to the outer world. 

Who by a happy home is streogthened most, 

Germania, as thou hast in patience tilled. 

So joy in thy fruition now at ease ; 

For still let nations, as mere private Man, 

Eemark, that he, whose soul takes no delight, 

In noting, how the fruit, through nature's grades. 

Turns fi'om its blossom to maturity. 

Is too unworthy, to partake its taste. 

Yea, Tristian, whilst with her philosophers 

And poets, all her mental toilers wrought. 

They, drawing on my sphere, partook of me, 



134 MAI^. 

And what they have, oft ia privation spun, 

Has, in the occult factory of time, 

Been woven in that cloth, whose bleaching now 

Astounds the world, as marv'ling she surveys 

The texture of her present Era's garb. 

When Honesty, Intelligence and Truth 

Attend the Spirit's loom, the Fates return 

The fabric in a bolt, whose wrappings less 

To sight denote, than its contents unfold ; 

For to those qualities, wliich Heaven needs 

In governing mankind, itself awards 

A premium, for their rarity on earth. 

Less than she was, has modest Germany 

Seemed to the world, which, with such envious eye 

Behold the riches of her mental yield, 

As leers the prodigal upon the till, 

His poor deemed neighbor's thrift has heaped with sums. 

Yet greater than himself had ever owned. 

In sooth, it is divine economy. 

That Simulation should acquire for Truth, 

Like factor gath'ring for his principal, 

Who can but handle, what another owns ; 

And thus Columbia — though in her inirm 

It only were a superfluity — 

Is fated, that she dig her mines of gold, 

^o pour the nettings in Germania's lap. 

Ah, that Columbia would understand, 

How, in return, she could be recompensed, 

If she the tendered spirit would accept ! 

As much in sorrow for Columbia 

As in rejoicing for Germania, 

The Truth must own, that proof is now extant : 

The people are with better rulers blest. 

In heaven's grace, than they are in their own, 

Unless it be, that humau governmeuts 

Make no exception to the standard rule, 

That, what is costliest, must needs be best. 

Still tried Germania, keep upperniost 

Thy earnest Eeason in thy government. 

Firm buttressed by the people's Honesty, 

Intelligence and Truth, and recollect. 

That no material prosperity. 

If universal, is a nation's bane. 

But only when the mass's means are turned 

To heave the few, beyond their merit's sail. 

Into the depths of superfluity. 

The people stinted in their nour ishment. 

Will then break open, like a drought rid plain. 

Be still thy maxim : 'To each one his due' 

For thou its application knowst the best. 



MA If. • 135 

Let still tliy princes^ wlio approve their worth, 

Dwell in the palace, but do not forget, 

Lest for the fault, thou pay the penalty, 

That, what thence emanates, must penetrate 

The cottage in those rays, that cheer not h eat- 

llem ember, to avail, all governments 

Must by a certain wisdom be inspired. 

Whose essence is not bettered by its source, 

Be that a single or a hundred brains ; 

Hence secondary to the country hold * 

All parties, whatsoever be their names. 

AVith no precocious innovation e'er 

Experiment, but full appreciate 

Whate'er the roll of Time unfolds, which can 

Be neither forced, nor staid, and when thy co urse 

Turns to Republic, be thou well prepared, 

To slide into it on an easy grade, 

;Not leap into it with a bloody bound, 

For then it were not worth thy sacrifice. 

Bat when that spell of license timely comes, 

Be thou as honest as in stern restraint. 

If then, thy handiest exemj^lar be 

Columbia, let thy Intelligence 

First strain her doctrines, ere adopting them. 

Heed too, when with Eepublic thou shalt mate, 

That thou restore her prostituted name 5 

And, as thou wouldst a serpent newly sloughed. 

Shun demagogues, for they, that reddest wear 

The Phrygian cap, have donned it for themselves, 

Or for the enemy. Trust thou no one. 

Because he is or poor, or well to do. 

For thy own spoliation may supply 

The Saturnalia upon a fast. 

Or its prolonging, when the own purse fails ; 

Thus Germany, is, in the present Age, 

What Greece was in her own. We'll visit next 

Where many fain would emulate the Seed. 



136 31 A If. 



CANTO XI. 



CONTENrS 

The Sontli's Defeat and i)resent Conclitiou. Apostrophe to New 
England. America in general : her Ailmejits. Tristian's Or- 
deal. The Spirit departs. 

Thou last in order, yet the first ia thought, 

Oohimbia ! shalt of the peopled earth, 

Be now the parting Spirit's final theme. 

As neared his visit's end, he since the last. 

Had. staid with Tristian, Avhen he thus resumed : 

As we're returned to thy domestic hearth, * 

The Spirit, too, partakes thy closet ease, 

To scan, with stranger's ken, thy proper state. 

Thine, like the ear of Love, dilates with hope, 

To fill with my laudation : futile aim ! 

Do not expect of me, to spread the board, 

Whereon the patient pampers his disease : 

Oh, Tristian ! be tlipu assured by me, 

x\.8 his inhaling his rebreathed air. 

In close confinement packed, is quelling to 

The vital spark of Man, so ruinous 

The insiuration, which a people draw 

From praise, they ever breathe upon themselves, 

In cjualmy fulsomeuess, as this thou hearst : 

' The best of governments, beneath the Sun !' 

' Of nations first, past, present, and to come !'. 

When thou beholdst such cream upon the tongue, 

Then know, the whey upon the stomach sours 5 

Yea when thou not'st that syren melody, 

That partly lures, and partly indicates, 

Be warned, the yawning precipice is near. 

Whereon, self puLsed, a people fondly rush. 

Think of Jerusalem, that horrors' sink, 

Whose vaunted name of Salem means : 'at peace' ; 

Of Paris think, which has been, to the ear, 

Mankind's Civilization's nursery. 

And, in the proof, a swarming hell of fiends : 

But even now, before thy doors, behold, 



MAN. 137 

How mocks that isle her ever faithful name ! 

Yea, Phrase of Praise ! thou truly art a fruit, 

Which, by ofthandliDg-, spoils to rottenness, 

And bursts upon the land, a plague, a curse ! 

If, therefore, thou thy Expectation sendst, 

To gather commendation, call it back. 

Since bootless only -vrouid its errant prove.'' 

" No more in time, were my assurance now, 

That in thy lore alone delights my soul, 

Who still droops there, where, words are sired bj^ wind. 

As through thy vision, I've beheld all time, 

So now returned into my proper close, 

— Unless thou deemst, it would profane our lore — 

I'd have thee scan it from the bottom up, 

Since, both by contrast and similitude. 

We, from below, best judge, what is above. 

Yea, show me, Spirit, what Columbia is, 

And thou shalt see, how she'll hereafter be ; 

But so thou wilt, we'll even make our start 

This dark, where thou hast deigned, to visit me. " 

'' Yea, dark it is, and darker still it glooms : 

The Churches, eased of metaphysics' task. 

Have lessened still the little, they have learned, 

To only know Eedemption from — that Fall ! 

And thus it comes, the best encomium, 

The land knovv's to bestow on Man, is that 

He is, or was a Christian gentleman ! 

Which praise will for its very looseness fit. 

Like to a bathing-gown, all customers ; 

Whereas, if he in verity had been 

A thorough imitator of the Christ, 

As well in practice as in theory, 

He never would have been such gentleman, 

As that he had been praised by tongue or print, 

But truly so obscure in name and poor, 

That but his relict or a trusty Tray 

Had moaned his elegies upon his grave. 

Oft have I marvelled, if they'd condescend, 

To blazon the obituary praise 

Of same humanitarian Gallio, 

How they would turn that phrase, the surname now, 

That follows, as the cannon's thud the flash, 

The patronymic of their cherished dead, 

— Esteemed in lore as hero nonetheless— 

AVho, leader in Columbia's civil war. 

At Fredericksburg victorious, forbore, 

For very feelings of a Christian, 

To wreak annihilation on the foe. 

Y^'ea, Tristian, not he has been the first, 

Who has discovered, if the Prince of Peace, 



138 MAN. 

In war is followed by the side of Writ, 

— Whichj for 'tis pastoral, is popular — 

His followers will in succeeding calm. 

Be less in humor, to own Heaven thanks. 

Yet, Tristian, 'tis piteous, that by 

That country's wretched plight, for which he fought, 

He, big of soul though staid, was worried. 

That he died broken hearted, as, alas ! 

Have thousands drooped, yet droop this very day, 

Of them, who cannot juggle with their souls. 

Yea, were that laud, in metaphysics versed, 

It never would have overweened, to own 

Peculiar immunity from God, 

So stay the Age's" growth 5 then had it known, 

If Man's device would from its falling prop 

The ripened fruit, wherewith the tree of Time 

Forever teems, it needs must burst in blood ; 

Then had it given freedom to its slaves, 

And arming them, would have achieved its goal ; 

Unless, it false protested to itself, 

And to the world, and it was slavery. 

Not independence, that it struggled for. 

But once upon their wing, there is no god, ^ 

To intercept the brood of Ignorance. 

Instead controlling now its Africans, 

As through humanity it could have done, 

That fated country withers underneath 

Their stupid and preposterous government ; 

But, Tristian, it will, to right its wrongs, 

To Metaphysics yet betake itself; 

Unless content, to use its Eeasou, like 

Those birds their wings, which are for running spread, 

Or some fish do their tins — to fly through air, 

The while it by that yoked on rule is wronged 

Of most the boons, which are this Age's due. 

Thou Pilgrim Laud ! that ever boast'st to be 

OwQ of the centres of intelligence, 

And, surely, art Columbia's very one. 

Of late thy politics are shallowing out, 

As erst thy orthodox theology ; 

Yet being,*^ as thou claimst, intelligent, 

Thou needs must know, from own expeiience, 

If from no stranger lore, that to the end. 

There is a struggle, which can know no truce, 

Between Intelligence and Ignorance. 

Equality between them is unknown : 

The winner's master, and the loser's slave ; 

Yea, wrongs press not alone, on whom they're laid. 

But, like a capstone on the pillar'd row, 

Bear down the wholej of which he is l>ut part : 



MAN, 139 

Dark envious Iguorance, imposed by thee, 

Now domineers Columbia's Soutliern half 

Far more in practice, as evinced in proof, 

Than ever thou design'dst in theory. * 

Scarce was that despot Ape installed, ere he 

Instinctively, as loth, to bear alone 

The execration of his stupid reign, 

Espoused Corruption as his meetesfc mate ; 

They have embraced: the issue know, when born. 

Yea, as the heart-lack marriage state between 

The human kind, can oidy be maintained. 

By riotous diversion and display ; 

So is the tie of this one ceaseless round 

Of those vile Saturnalias, that get 

Those blues, which being red, are thus misnamed ; 

For better 'tis, for Peace to tly, than stay 

Where she is onl3' as the pander used 

By Villany, to prostitute the rule. 

Most fell tlie politician-bandits' plague. 

And wretchedst of all hapless lands on earth. 

Is that controlled by spoliating rogues : 

The highwayman, that bids one yield his purse. 

In his romaiice, makes some, how poor return 

To countries he infests; the Chivalry, 

Who made their booty where they could assert, 

In Europe left their castles' mystic lore ; 

But as pure milk will heave its cream on top. 

Foul water but its scum, what can the pool, 

By politician-bandits fouled, distill. 

Save pestilential vapors, which will break 

Eventually in such horrid gush, 

As may wont France, but not Columbia drench ? 

Yea, Pilgrim Land, take counsel to thyself : 

Throughout Columbia, the government, 

W^hose theory presents to outside view. 

Like some stupendous, gorgeous palace' front. 

Is vile in practice, like that tinsel kind, 

Wherein Society its evil feasts. 

And in no part, Abomination so 

Unlicensed Haunts, as in that Southern wing. 

Yea, as that land is most luxurious 

In its exuberance ; so it ^bounds 

With noxious parasites, and therefor needs 

The most of tending, lest all good be choked. 

Be not deluded by the selfish thought, 

Tbtit caring only for thy proper home 

Shall keep thee safe, and that one part the land, 

That it be not offended with the stench, 

Can with impunity its garbage dump 

Upon the other, overfoul itself; 



140 MAN. 

For, never yet, has epidemic beeu, 

That would coufiue its ravage sweep of death 

But to the nest, whence it was hatched and winged. 

Be warned in time : 'tis only in the calm 

That vapors gather for catastrophes : 

These rise beyond thy own horizoii's icen ; 

The Spirit sees, how they accumulate. 

Move thou an alteration in the air, 

For any change is better than this foul, 

Which'^is exhaled from the enfranchised s^ rule, 

That rottened for its prematurity. 

Yea, Pilgrim Land, take the initiative, 

And be the only, that the North resume 

The sway to conqueror due, for were it not, 

That he impose his dictum on the foe. 

With whom he stood the ordeal of death, 

Then were a flaw in Heaven's primal law. 

And merely pastime slaughter were such wars ; 

For Might is Eight, since, if it were not so, 

It never could prevail, which it can do 

But whilst itself incorporates the Eight. 

But never feign, the substitution of 

That proved superiority, by worse 

Than vanquished's own inferiority, 

Can e'er redound to good to any part ; 

For now thy boon the sequel overtops, 

That in bestowings, whicli are undeserved. 

Three subjects are abused : the giver, gift 

And taker, since in this, the flrsc despoiled 

Is, by the change or owners, worst abused. 

Thou'lt say : ' The suffrage of the Africans, 

Though by the present generation spoiled. 

Will in the grov^ing educated own 

Intrinsic worth' ; Yea haply may it teem. 

As does salvation's hope in suicide, 

And be as like destroyed in proof! When they. 

By that vile training, which they now receive. 

Are qualified to judge, be not surprised. 

It' then the Country its republic loves, 

Vrith such emotion, as his coppers he. 

Who in's disposal has no better coin.— 

AVe'll from some parts, now pass upon the whole : 

Hail, free and generous Colamijial 

There is but one emotion, which exceeds 

The Spirit's joy at what thou art, and that's 

The grief, at what thou could st be, and art not ! 

The standard for thy present, in our lore 

Shall be the dower, thou got'st at thy start : 

Thou wast located in this universe, 

Where Man may of this blessed earth take up 



MAN^. 141 

A. haudful of iier giouud, without the feary 

That he shall disecrate a martjT?\s dust, 

Which animated quivered on the rack, 

The scaffold or the stake, reared b}' the curse 

Of either Tyranny or Ignorance j 

Yea, happ'ly didst thou 'scape that arm of death. 

Fell Persecution, like a spectre, stretched 

All Europe over to remotest nook ; 

And doubly blest thy settlers in their flight, 

That then the monster, tottering in his age, 

Could only strike, who came beneath his reach. 

And not pursue, whom he his victims willed. 

Thus, in the total, has tliy bounty been. 

That thy Civilization thou hast got. 

Like as in mother^s hip the babe'is laid, 

Laved by the midwife of the gory slough. 

Wherein it by the travail had been bruised ; 

And as thou, nursing, wakest her smiles with smiles, 

Thou needst not be remembered of the woes. 

Which were endured, ere she was brought to life, 

More than the feasting on that dainty root 

Reminds the epicure, how rank the bed. 

Whence it the substance and the juice has drawn. 

Remember thus, thy culture dates not from 

Thy settlement, but from the first of Man's ; 

For though thy pioneer must needs contend 

With Indian, he was no savage then. 

Thou too, the star of Liberty hadst fixed 

Unerriug on thy dome : if it is dioimed, 

'Twas but by exhalations from thyself; 

For thou hadst naught to dread from foreign foe, 

And all thy welfare rested in own hands. 

Yea, Tristian, although Columbia 

Owned, of the nations, first thy love, behold, 

What commendation is a people's due, 

Whose character in ethics will confound 

The base of Smartness with the genuine 

Of Wisdom, and for current use will give 

The ibrmer preference ! Where, Avho adheres 

So fixed in honesty, as star so named, 

And will not, by a public trust's abuse, 

Be extricated from his poverty. 

Is dubbed as but an execrable fool ? 

Where smartness gotten wealth's the goal of all. 

And ofiice holding, and aspiring scamps, 

Who even simulated virtue lack, 

But blazon their successful vice unveiled. 

Can from the people's guardian, the Press, 

As readily purchase, with their ofiice' spoils, 

Their fulsome laud as public savor to 



142 MAy. 

Their rauk^ curruption taiuted cbaracters, 

As Yenal females plyiusf their abuse, 

The odors of ai)othecaries buy, 

To queach their foubiess, and to give it soeut? 

Yea, Tristian, it long since had been meet, 

Columbia's publicists had pondering paused, 

To question, whether they not ^Y^onged themselves, 

In sounding still those ]>eans, which now pall 

Upon the sense? That epoch, deemed so far, 

Has rounded in, and for her liberty, 

Judicious nations envy her no more. 

Let Man reflect, what share of factors' meed 

For her prosperity, the country owes 

To her vast stretch of fertile territory, 

And her rich sources of uncounted wealth, 

Which waited tilling by unelbowed Man : 

Let him deduct this mass, and then he'll know. 

What remnant's owing to the government. 

Let him then charge, upon its debit side, 

The franchises, and public property, 

Which, for the people's lack of confidence 

In their own creature, known as government, 

They gave away to individuals : 

Wise illustration of self-government ! 

The people make a present of their own, 

Eatlier than trust its ministration to 

Their government, for their own benefit ! 

Yet, though those Corporations have no souls, 

Own they not hearts, wliich for the people beat ? 

And are their members not the people too ! 

Does it not follow, Avhat these have bestowed 

And those have taken, is the peonle's still, 

And fills the public's, not the privates' Durse ! ~ 

Yea, if thou canst, tell that Eepublic's worth, 

Where, from disgust, the better portion shun 

Participation in the government. 

Which, uucon tested, "^ to the vile is left 

For usurpation and abuse at will ! 

But let us pause a moment, and reflect : 

Since now the government is 'mainly sought. 

And got by them, who are for nothing fit. 

And yet all men are to some end designed. 

May not, to govern, be the role of these ? 

It is the country's curse, to teach its youth. 

That freedom's tree is grateful, in the main, 

In that they all shall have an equal chance. 

To pluck the fruit it teems : its offices ! 

'Tis no such thing ! the interest of each 

Is less, to own an office, than to see 

It filled conducive for the public weal : 



ifAJT. 143 

That nation could not be, or if she were, 

She'd soon to pieces rot, where every one 

Aspired, himself, to own a public trust. 

Yea, truly Tristian, as surfeited 

The Jewish nation on theology, 

And retched, to heave otf the invaders' yoke. 

Until they forced those horrors ou themselves. 

That ended not with their Jerusalem ; 

And as the people of the Southern States 

Were in their pampered slav'ry so engrossed. 

That they forgot, there was aught else on earth, 

Until its fall had buried them beneath; 

So now Columbia's inherent bane, 

And one, that needs must in disaster end. 

Is too much politics : oue law controls 

The constitutions of all commonwealths, 

As those of flesh and blood ; for as one dish 

Will foul the stomach, both of Man and beast ; 

So one pursuit will sour upon the State : 

Hence, in their ethics, States must cultivate 

Variety, that thus the mind of Man 

Course as diversely as the universe. 

And, hank'ring, throng not on a focus spot, 

Wherewith the State top-heavy overturns : 

Then Ideality will raise the mind 

Above the grossness of the body's lusts, 

Whose goading will not cease, till worried Man 

Stoops to corruption, to procure their fill — 

Delusion, thou art never pushed for feints ! 

Long were the people blinded with the thought. 

That, though they ever lost the better part 

Of their net earnings, through their trusts' abuse ; 

Yet, they that robbed them, Avere but of themselves, 

And that their spoils sank not into ground, 

But circulated to the people back ! 

And so they do, but 'tis like water, which 

Should irrigate the plain, that for its lack, 

Stares bleak and sterile, whilst the stream is let 

To flow into the swamps, Avhere it but fouls, 

And thence, thro' clouds returns, to whence it sprang : 

Though what the evil sow, the good may reap, 

No seed plant is the formers' luxury ; 

And though they must relapse to whence they rose. 

Yet class not oflice holders with the mass ; 

For when they qualify, with rare exceptions, 

Like priests ordained*, they are distinct of caste 

In deed, though not in Ibrm, which recks as naught : 

Kot 'gainst nobility or Ibreiguers 

Has Paris lately raged in horrid scenes ; 

For they that have evoked the maddened wreak. 



1-14 MA N-. 

Had issued from the people, and so claimed. 

This mostly comes from juggling policy. 

Which yields some more, some less, than is their due; 

For did a country's rivers flow with milk, 

If swinish Iguorance and foxish Craft 

Are let to lap, and raven on the cream, 

Modest Intelligence and Honesty, 

The very marrow in a country's stock, 

Must be content, to famish on the curd. 

As I have intimated from the first, v 

Predictions are but for an idle head. 

Which, in its emptiness of living lore, 

Would grope into the murky womb of Time j 

Yet, if at times, thou fain wouldst speculate, 

Thou mayst conjecture, that will come to pass. 

Which thou hast ascertained, has never been ; 

For but the injudicious vision feigns 

A repetition in the flight of Time, 

Whose wing, indeed, but even now has touched 

That novel theme, which erst was ridiculed : 

The suffrage of the fairer half of Man. 

Yea, be assured, her cup of liberty 

Columbia will empty to its dregs. 

Ere she, in lamentation, part her lips. 

Has she not, in true womanly despair, 

Set Africa, the former servant of 

Her erst rebellious daughter, 'bove her now. 

To mistress her, that she, secure, might quat' 

Her freedom's draught, mixed by that ebon romp ? 

lea, all as frail, as she is generous, 

Has not Columbia, as in consciousness, 

Belike, of her own taint, descended in 

Her comradeship, with that facility. 

Evinced by females, who do know themselves 

Intrinsically less, than their repute. 

And who, secure, ignore the very herd. 

With w^hom they troop, when in embarrassment ? 

Does not Columbia now countenance 

Those dignitaries, Africa can boast ! 

That nameless coterie, but faint redeemed 

By some few Eeverends, yet greatly swelled 

By bandits in the wilds of politics, 

xVnd those vile renegades, who since the change 

In their estate, fast ply their slimy tows 

To the new favorite, as they had first 

Incensed their ousted mistress to the strife ? 

This being stressed Columbia's present plight, 

She, in her woman's humor of despair. 

Will urge herself, what now is urged from her. 

In hope, thereby, to gain her pristine state; 



But all in vaiii : A hundred gross, how sound 

They be, canuot refresh one tainted egg-, 

But only bigger heap the rottenness. 

Wherewith she'd* quench, will prove but fuel for 

Auotlier lire. Thou of reforms shalt hear : 

They'll die in their design ; corruption too. 

At times, shall slack, as epidemics lull, 

But only to recruit the force they spent ; 

8 he will invoke the spirit ; did he come. 

He'd stare unheeded. Tristian, be warned, 

That those rank weeds, which overrun her held, 

And overweening, she not cares to crop, 

Much less to pluck, will aye luxuriate, 

Till by the subsoil plow oi* civil war 

They be eradicated, and the field. 

Left fallow by the turmoil weary mass, 

Be then appropriated by a mind, 

Whose single hand can'^sow a better seed : 

By oue, who'll be his own original, 

And will empower none not capable 

And houest; one who'll dare, to mar his make, 

The very moment Avhen he soils his trust. 

Columbia shall no Goths and Vandals need. 

For she produces them upon her soil : 

Eveutful changes ripen in this age 

With an electric speed ; if not before, 

That time will fall, whenever elbow room 

The people lack, and from their 'customed way, 

They'll deem to need, when reallv they do not : 

This day in that North- West, so^^aunted late, 

There are localities, that retrograde ; 

Where settlers fast, as they had risen, drop 

Beneath the universal, sloven rule. 

Compare the system to a china bowl, 

In which, the cracks it sprung, are spreading still, 

So when it breaks, thou'lt hear the owner say : 

There's not much lost, it was already cracked ! 

Yet, Tristian, if, like lines on map, I should 

Trace out those fissures, what would it avail ? " 

^' Thou doest but see, not make what thou beholdst! 

Yet, Spirit, sad, too sad, to contemplate 

What thou prognosticat'st : Columbia, 

Who made Humanity her Genius 

Should by her very choice be thus undone 

In having too confiding been in Man, 

And letting rule, who still should have obeyed !' 

Yea, Man owes more to her, than he'd confess ; 

For she his pioneer on many a field, 

Which yearning Europe dared not venture on, 

Or having entered, only was too glad, 



146 MAN, 

To 'scape again, for lier escutcheon's liigb, 

Where other nations yet but aim below. 

Concede, that she at times seemed rude*c it was 

Inherent to her charge, nor do forget, 

'Twas in their liberality, the mass 

Have winked at those abuses, rushing now 

To that catastrophe, which thou perceiv'st. 

Eemember, as thou scorest her good and ill. 

How, like a mother to her stricken babe, 

She bared her bosom of Humanity 

Unto her Prairie offspring, that again 

It draw the sap, the fiery Horror lapped 5 

That from her loins, that Heaven's Almoner, 

Peabody sprang, whose blest munificence 

— When wealth ennobled, he ennobled wealth — 

The dreary commentary puts on Man, 

That only they, who are unable, would 

Be imitators ot his heart sprung deeds. 

Yea, thou omniscient ^Spirit, well hast said, 

^vVheu Man needs nothing more, he has but naught : 

'Tis true, for where a lack ot" need, there's death. 

Scarce hadst thou raised that sorrow from my soul. 

Before another pang slipt in its void ; 

For, Spirit, I have never known the time, 

I could enjoy a bliss, that was but mine, 

And since, whereof I'm part is next to me, 

^eed I to tell, what thou knowst but too well ? 

If there be an^^ means, that maj^ avert 

Columbia's nearing, dread catastrophe. 

And thou art not forbidden from al30ve, 

Do not withhold it, but impart it now, 

And my life's task shall be, to stay that doom, 

l^or I have in success a confidence, 

Exceeded onl}- by ]ny fiiith in thee : 

Yet in Columbia, Intelligence, 

Eeagon and Truth can channel their own course 

To where they will, despite Self-interest 

That stemes with Falsehood and with Ignorance ; 

For here the people will not first demand 

A Charter from Antiquity, ere they 

Advent'rous throw themselves upon new streams. " 

^' Then have thy will, since once thou smooth'stthy hate 

Of all that's kin to politics, which like 

A slimy reptile through thy bosom creep : 

Thou yet rememberst, I commented on 

Some sentences, and traced their germs in Writ . 

Whereon Mankind have, like on pivots, turued, 

For weal and woe : Columbia owns two, 

Her own outgrowths, which feed on whence they sprang: 

Yet they're exceptioiis to the well known rule, 



MAN. 147 

That lliere's no ill, but some of good will yield; 

For tlieso are merest evil, unredeemed : 

They are two worms, wliicb, in the country's stock, 

Bore through its marrow from both ends at once, 

As did the miners throuoh that Cenis Mount: 

They gnaw and ras]>, they blast, delve, pick and scoop. 

By o-ang reliefs, and merging night with dav, 

The Sunday with the week, conjecture tlioii, 

JIow soon they botli sliail in the centre meet, 

Directed by a Vine, as i>redesigned, 

As was that tunnel's by its engineer, 

Yea, as yond planets' orbits by their God. 

Thou marvelst, what may bo these hell owned worms ? 

And yet, thou liearst tliem quoted any honr : 

But 'tis no wonder, since so many things 

'^ow in their essence but belie their names. 

And 'tis the devil's sport, tirat he divert 

With evils feigned, from those, which wax to blast. 

But as from first I have enforced on thee, 

So also know these reptiles by .their deeds : 

\Yhen one had quickened, Honesty was told, 

That Yillany had equal countenance 

Before the people, to attain the rule, 

And that she must cope with the Underhand, 

Or lea^e to it the uncontested field : 

Yfhat then could modest Honesty else do, 

Than shrink from vile contamination back, 

And stay away from politics, for aye, 

Which thence haAe sunk into those sorry depths ? 

Thus know, for name that worm does own the phrase, 

That spells: ' All means are fair in politics' ; 

The other crawls 'Ibro every office' door. 

Where it, unlike its fabled 'Eden type, 

Him who's installed, although an honest Man, 

Not tempts with words, but in his instinct prompts : 

' Thou art a victor, for thou overcamest 

A foe, whom now it is thy right to spoil, 

And be thou warned, thy harvest lasts not long. ' 

Who is to be the victim '? Surely not 

The then defeated, counter aspirants ? 

When, quick in evil, further prompts the worm : 

' Thy oiiice is the spoil, and therein prey 

Upon the people, as an enemy, 

Eegardless, whether thy own partisans; 

For thou the people vanquished'st in success. 

And they're the victims, whatso party win : 

All scruples oust, for had the adverse side, ' 

Yictorious proved, they would no better fare. 

Yea, it has got, that Man, on beaten side, 

Is really more than half an alien. 



148 MAN, 

And truly less tbau liulf ti citizen. 

Keedst thou be told, this worm's kiiowu by the phrase, 

That to the Victor shall the spoils beloug ? 

If ever thou canst crush these reptiles' heads, 

Thou Shalt regenerate Columbia. 

I make no doubt, there is of righteonsness 

As great i:>roportion in her citizens, 

As elsewhere on the peopled earth ; but know, 

Grain needs replanting, weeds renew themselves : 

Their honesty, intelligence and truth 

Must be aggressive 'gainst their restless foes j 

I^ot to annihilate, bub to subdue 

Whatever would of Evil upward strive, 

And when that's bent, what struts as master now, 

The good no more shall be the vicious' dupes. 

Yea, hrst of all, let them the purity 

From private to their public life transplant. 

And they shall reap, where vermin raven now ! 

But, save there's need, I vrarn tliee once for all, 

In her devotion to the Lord, do not 

Disturb Columbia, though she'll know too late, 

That 'tween Cupidity and Turpitude, 

By Opportunity, an easy bridge 

Is thrown across the direst pains of hell : 

'Tis but ridiculous, for fright of lambs, 

A scare be fixed before the tempting grapes : 

The fox has for the bugbear neither eye, 

'Not ear to list the gong of promised feast. 

If aught avert her plague, it is thy lore ; 

And what's thy destiny, thou must pursue, 

Which to, foretell, would break thy needed goad. 

Yet heed my guiding ken : tliou'lt build on lier 

With Doubt and Care ; full soon thy Doubt miiy leiive 

And let thee, lab'ring, shift alone with Care. 

Thus from the first of Man's recorded time, 

Have we, with hurried bounds and shortened stays, 

Descended to our very time of speech, 

And now, what I have broadlj^ stated or 

But intimated, gather in review : 

Thou through the Ages' misty rise and set, 

For coming, as for past eternity. 

Hast peered the lasting mystery of Mail, 

And now thou ownst the faculty to read 

The universe, as if she were inscribed 

In letters of thy own vernacular. 

To answer what thou queriest in this life. 

Yet, Tristian, consider thou art like 

A verdant rustic, who has sleepless tilled 

A strange exotic merely for its buds. 

And then is stunned to hear, its precious worth 



MAN^, 149 

Lies ill its roots, wliicii yield their weight in gold ; 

Yea, as a yeoman, in his harvest's yiekl 

Already overjoyed, yet strikes npon 

A treasure- trove, so thou, who deemst thyself, 

More than yet mortal, in my coming blest, 

Hast pending over thee the boon of boons : 

When erst I charged thee to be serious, 

M3' adjuration's stress com]>ared to this, 

As does a dream to the reality. 

J^ow grasp thou back, and in this moment stow 

That afternoon, when fell the Fall on thee, 

That evening too, thou feltst me. on that bridge. 

And yet that hour, I raised from thee the Fall. 

Now thou art charged, to level with my theme. 

Deem those emotions only as mere gulfs 

Unto this moment's Main ; for 'tis to thee 

The pregnant seed for all eternity, 

Since on thy choice the Future shall be reared. 

With soul fixed on this Present and the Past, 

Heed, as thou wouldst thy life, what I disclose : 

Thou yet rememberst having charged me erst, 

To yield a certain help, because mine is 

A visitation, which may not repeat 

In thousand and more years. I then adjourned 

My answer to meet time : that time has come, 

And Tristian it is thou, that art the Man, 

Who is the mark for scores of centuries : 

This Age's void is, that mankind must own 

A new Eeligion ; the invisible 

E'er fecund womb of Time teems with it now, 

And whether still-born, or alive it fall, 

Is for decision given but to thee ; 

For it is thou, who must its founder be. 

Else none, while Earth retains her present cast. 

When yet the world was circumscribed to Man, 

The Lord of Mose' sufficed, commensurate 

With Man's young notions of Grod's workmanship. 

How knowledge of Creation has oustript 

That of Creator, as portrayed in creeds ; 

And how these strive, by their Procrustean shifts, 

To bridge the gap, that widens day by da}". 

What needs to tell, since it distracts the world ? 

As earth to sun, not sun to earth now wheels; 

80 is the knowledge of mankind reversed. 

For they must know, that Providence expects 

Else from their ripeness than their infancy. 

Whereon the Dispensation rests, but thou. 

And not the world docs know : sulfice, that still 



rp 



The Christian faith continues slivering 

Into more sects : its mission-bounds are touched 



150 MA]!f. 

It has couveifced but one Iburtli of Mail, 

And now its force to spread's forever spent, 

For though its Holy Ghost abides in creed, 

Its Spirit breathes but in Humanity, 

VMiero it will last, coeval \yith mankind ; 

There Indian Trimurti loses caste. 

And China no religion owns, or takes : 

Tlie Hebrews, even, liave themselves reuounced 

AH hope to repossess Jerusalem, 

For if they could, they would not there return ; 

The Shiite Persians, and the Sonnite Turks 

Abhor each other worse, than either hate 

The Jews or Christians, and of these last, 

The Protestant, the Roman and the Greek 

Do one another execrate, at least, 

As earnest as the Moslems or the Jews, 

Or else, the true believers falsily. 

All those spasmodic church revivals turn 

But with relapses as alternatives, 

And bibles only now contest the i)alm 

With picture albums as an ornament. 

Save those, which that Society still pokes 

In offices and courts, for that abuse, 

Which is correctly by the Writ denounced. 

Man for tlie forum, tribune and the press 

Foregoes the pulpit, whose still thinning ranks 

Are most recruited through its gratis schools. 

Or through that second choice, when first has iaiied 

For those professions, quoted as profane ; 

For your true shepherd of Ihe biped flock, 

Like veritable tender on the rleece, 

Prefers, to couple certain livelihood 

With basking ease, to shifts from day to «.lay. 

In few, that blood has now outbought itself, 

Whilst all mankind are unifying fast 

In one opinion of indifference. 

My human friend ! E charge thee, to reflect. 

Were not this worse infliction on mankind. 

Than mere delusion and credulity, 

Since these are ever gusted more by Man, 

Than cool iudilference and unbelief? 

Yea, Tristian, there is the pinch of stress. 

That other Dispensation come to Man, 

To brand those evils, only winked at now, 

Because, in Writ, they have been undenounced. 

Thou'dst teach, that Knowledge, Keasou, Honesty 

And Truth, producing love ot God and Man, 

Are, all in all, sufficient for this life. 

Be disabused, for knowst thou not too well, 

The world still holds with those divines of Grace, 



MA JS'. 151 

That all morality, which does not bear 
The trademark of a creed, is nothing more 
Than filthy rags ; yea, that Humanity, 
Philosophy are brazen idols propped 
On feet of clay ; that from their sockets stare 
But lumps of paste, instead those lustrous orbs ? 
What, though the Truth flash on thy eager soul, 
Like tropic's noontide sun ? Still by the world, 
'Tis unregarded, like those distant stars. 
But seen by them, who seek their sphres, and thus, 
Truth is not Truth, unless 'tis Truth revealed. 
In vain shalt thou display its sheen to Man, 
Unless thou set up his credulity, 
As her reflector : only by that ghire 
Canst thou attract the instinct of mankind. 
Thoult futile strive, to raise a monument 

Of knowledge, be thine ever so immense, 
. Unless thou make a creed its i)edestal : 

Attempt it, and thou'lt but a tombstone rear 
To thy own happiness. The loud report, 

Thou'dst make of Honesty, will only be 

As powder's loose let off Tnot heard, scarce seen, 

And that but in its smoke ; whereas, if charged 

Within the pulpit's bore, 'twill strike such thud, 

As rouses Man from his i)ropricty. 

Know, ail creation cannot be but head, 

But that for body also there is need : 

How many brains for meditation are 

Incapable ! whereas, to but believe 

Is easy, as 'tis difficult to think ; 

Compare it thus : the Truth is uniform, 

As is Man's body born, in nakedness. 

And systems of religion are to Truth, 

As are its raiments to the human form ; 

Yet though the fashion ever change his dress, 

Man would not think to act in nature's state. 

That, therefore with no freezing tardiness, 

The world recei\'e thy lore, tliou art constrained, 

To flavor it with its credulity. 

And if it were, as soda-syrups are. 

With but a drop of essence to the quart : 

The body of thy lore still be itself. 

Yea, Tristiau, thy gold of Truth's too pure, 

To pass for current, ere it be alloyed ; 

And do not fear, thou'it do a wrong thereby. 

For when to present creed that mercy-stroke, 

Which now impends, has been administered, 

Judicious Man shall own to thee his thanks. 

For having settled firm his ousted heart, 

Which Pise, through t1)e imiwensity of space 



152 MA IT. 

Were set a whirling, searcliiug for its stay. 

Thou askst : but will tliat Dispensation be 

The genuine ? Forsooth, it shall be true 

To him, who will believe, and false to him, 

Who'll disbelieve, for, Tristian, I surmise, 

That standard rall}^ of all churches, which 

AYere founded yet, will be the new one's too : 

'. Who doubts is damned.' However of details 

Myself will not affirm, since not from me. 

Bat through another spirit, whom I'll send 

Thou'lt get authority, to promulgate 

The new Eeligion : he'll impart to thee 

A thorough discipline from first to last. 

KnoTi^ only, that for thy i)erfection thou 

Shalt need no conference of forty days j 

Nor will thy church, when founded once on earth, 

Eequire thy intercession from beyond, 

Between her persecutors and herself. 

Fear not, that spirit shall that Adverse be, 

Who though but one, yet ever holds his own . 

Against the Three, and all the Saints to boot : 

He, w ho, although ignored, denied in words, 

Yet knows, he is the more confessed in deeds. 

And that, instead his hold upon the priests. 

He has the politicians safe in thrall. 

Y^ea, though he all too fain, would revel in 

Another Dispensation's throes, and yearns, 

To gloat again on martyrs, heretics. 

The Crusades, and the Keformation's w^ars ; 

Y^et he's aware, that in a change of creed. 

He might not tare so w ell, but likely lose 

That tenure of mankind, he held from erst. 

No, Tristian, he whom I shall delegate, 

Will be a spirit of a softer cast, 

Y^et so proficient in his craft, that he. 

Beyond the reach of forward Science' test, 

With reason Season shall annihilate } 

Enough of him : thou'lt know him by his deeds. 

Spare thy objections, for they are too nice : 

An edge, too finely ground, is but a thread. 

Nor underbrave, nor overcautious be, 

Lest thou Shalt loll between awake and sleep ; 

Y'ea, Tristian, though thou heardst from even me, 

That for eternity no system lasts, 

x\nd that all bodies undergo their change j 

Y"et, for this only once, be politic, 

And thy example froni those statesmen take, 

Who ever cavil with the government. 

Till its portfolio they bear themselves : 

Thus be the kernel in our strictures' nut, 



MAN, 153 

That thou the cheapened ground appropriate, 

To found a ne\Y Eeligion's edifice : 

Hence on that axis turn thy round of thought, 

And Disappointment's hissing gibberish 

Shall never deafen thy expectant ear, 

For Man, harmonious, then shall vie to sound 

Thy praises' instruments, as thou shalt tune ; 

Yea, wliat were else imputed as thy blame, 

Shall be converted to thy righteousness, 

As on those unctuous ways, impelled by Faith, 

Thou shalt, through life, in one ovation glide. 

While the new Era from thy birth shall date. 

Then thou the master, not the slave of chance, 

Shalt see thy woes endured, sprout lasting bliss. 

But wretched Tristian, if thou decline ! 

Tough in a tissue thou shiWt work my lore ; 

Instead a net, -twill but a canvas prove, 

Wherewith thy sighs shall blow thee to Despair. 

Yea, Tristian, then Hope shall blind her eye, 

And thou, indifferent in the world's esteem"^, 

— Disgust within thy heart, shame on thy eyes — 

Shalt be but Sorrow owned, forgot, or known 

To Man in only deprecating shrugs. 

Thy soul, now in my stay serene, shall be 

Lashed by Kemorse as is the sea with Storms ) 

But brace her now, for this eternal cast : 

Or smile on th' unaverted front of Fame, 

Or stare for aye, on slighted Fortune's back, 

To thee, through life,an ever present grave. " 

'* Still be it more and less, than thou hast summed, . 

My soul, distending to her utmost stretch, 

To scale the grandeur of thy wondrous boon, 

Has, by collision with the firm fixed Truth, 

Almost relapsed into her normal state. 

As positive, as of my life, I am, 

That, in the proof, thou'dst make thy promise good ; 

But, Spirit, no ! IS^t for this earth's control. 

And I have taxed its value to the full, 

For thou wilt own, mine's not a novice' say, 

And that I am not strange to woe, thou know'st ! 

Yet not, and were it to be deified. 

Would I my goal, through Man's delusion scale. 

Though it were thinner than a spider's web. 

< )mmiscient Spirit ! better than myself 

Knowst thou, my soul endures no stranger graft, 

i>iit must content herself with her own stock : 

What's there, thou with thy lore didst cultivate. 

And what it fruits is His, who gave the seed. " 

'• The Spirit's superhuman ordeal, 

Of all that have been ushered through the womb, 



154 MAN, 

Thou only stoodst uiitlawed, and in thyself 

Hast given x)roof, how potent is my lore. 

As yonder clouds beneath the lasting Sun, 

80 iiits Delusion underneath the Truth ; 

And her no seeker ever shall behold, 

But he thy name shall there relieeted see. 

However indispensable mankind 

May deem Delusion for their tie to ( xod : 

Of all uncounted ways to Him, there is 

But one, which is the straight, and that is— Truth. 

Yea, like all others, that Delusion too 

Is fair to taste, but to digestion foul, 

And he, who sows it, cannot know its crop. 

My mission now to thee is at an end : 

We part this moment till we meet J'or aye : 

Meanwhile ai^propriate what was my own." 

" Alas ! what shall 1 be, when thou art gone ? 

Yea, we must part I That tliou couldst stay for aye, 

Or 'bide on earth, till we together wing. 

As kindred Spirits to thy Infinite ! 

To part ! to go ! On earth to meet no more ! 

I have lost them, from whom my heart has sprung. 

And who, in life, have been its very core 5 

1 have lost friendship, love, my kinsfolk ail, 

And now stand like a solitary trunk 

Upon the glade, jagged, weatherbeaten, torn, 

With but the sprouts and saplings underneath, 

Which have been pro})agated from its shed. 

My childhood left me, and my youth is gone : 

My manhood, too, will soon extend its hand, 

To shake its parting and my use from earth ; 

But ere this moment have I never felt, 

Have never known, how sounds that vford : to go ! 

O Spirit, that thou hadst substantial form, 

That I could press my own from out this bulk, 

In one farewell, so we'd commingled fly, 

Anticipating now that meet again ! " 

" Fond Tristian, although I leave thee now. 

We're yet companioned in thy memory ; 

And when thou wouldst commune with me, retnrn 

But to my lore, and there we'll ever meet. 

One final word : as oscillates the beam 

On yonder craft, which now departs the port, 

And by its motion drives it through the main ; 

So, vibrating between the Good and III, 

Mankind impel the life, that bears them on, 

And with the motion ceases life and all : 

Our separation will be brief : I stand 

Thy guardian still 5 farewell, until we meet ! " 

" If it be Heaven's will, that I shall die 



MAir, 155 



In consciousness, upon tlie thoug-ht of thee 
My soul shall part into eternity. *^ 



15G MAK, 



CA.NTO XII 



CONTENTS 

America's Kegeneratiou. Tristian stumbles ou the Hereafter. 
America's Relapse, aud Tristian Return to his native Land. 
The Spirit revisits him, and sets him right for Life aud Death. 
The Mission of Tristian. 

As if his essence liad escorted back 

The Spirit whence he came, so Tristian, 

Though moving on, no longer seemed of earth : 

For listless he, like one who walks in sleep, 

His senses but in inner function owned ; 

Yet like a pioneer in Western wilds, 

AVho 'tween his logs with Desolation sits, 

When by Disaster's soatch his all is plucked, 

And tlien, as by a sudden tiu^n of thought, 

Is jostled from the rack of revery 

To consciousness of what, and where he is : 

80 Tristian, upon his Mission's rouse, 

Shook from himself his hemming lethargy, 

And with : ^1 mnst,- as by the push of fate, 

His soul dilating with cnthnsiam, 

He summoned but Discretion to his side, 

Then sallied forth, as eager to let out, 

As he before has been, to gather in 

The lore, the Spirit had in secret taught. 

For his debut he chose Columbia, 

And her Kegeneratiou as his theme : 

Without a CO u sulfation quickly he 

Tlie diagnosis of the patient made : 

He glanced but on her tongue, and then he knew 

What ailments were denoted in its coat ; 

Yea, from the odor of her breath, he gauged. 

How he should purge her to a healthy state. — 

As first the sun peers on the mountain tops ; 

So broke his lore first on those knowledge' spheres, 

Where Man's Intelligence the highest dares. 

It were as bootless, to relate at large 

Where it was welcomed, and where closed against, 



MAN. 157 

As it would be to tell, what doors and blinds 

Are shut or opened to the radiant orb. 

Suffice, as well the world already knows, 

A house or church, that's built against his beams, 

Is seldom incommoded by the light ; 

Yet even such, how else obscure, all turned 

Their onslaught from that snake of Paradise 

Now 'gainst those worms, the Spirit had denounced. 

Not boisterously smote his lore on Man ; 

But steady as the roll of time it wrought, 

And waked at first no echo, save the bruit : 

* Whence did the Spirit come, and who was he ? ' 

Some answered, that it was the Holy Ghost, 

But when reminded, that this came on earth, 

In function only to beget a god, 

And that tlie issue was no deity, 

They fixed, it was not he, but wondered on. 

His lore fast coursing through Columbia- s ranks, 

— Although more wholesome to digestion, than 

Delightful to the palate, proved the Truth— 

These meliorations were the principal : 

All those theologists, Vvho would not flee 

Congenially into parrot's form, 

If transmigration of the soul were true, 

No more their noddles stroked, to indicate. 

How they could solve the doctrines' Gordiaii knots 

Of Trinity, Predestination and 

God's Forlciture to Satan of mankind 5 

No longer, in their pulpits, Ileverends, 

With feelings less, than actors on the stage, 

Hid simulate Man's sorrows, feigned or real : 

But now in earnestness bethought themselves, 

Instead, to sponge the features of the dead. 

How they should heal the wounds of living lime, 

And adequate consideration give 

Unto their congregation for their hire ; 

And now all fairs of Sects, for this and that, 

Aired to the sense of Charity but foul, 

Por she no more distinguished creed from creed. 

Amongst the children, in their nursery. 

The Serpent was no more allowed to creep 

And smite their spirit into wretchedness ; 

But for their pleasure, at the Sunday Schools, 

In bonfires crackled all the legend woe. 

That, like a mildew, touched their tender souls; 

And though, old Franklin's homespun axioms. 

Unworthy him, his country, and his Age, 

Were still misplanted, they were also taught, 

That, since he daunted Lightning with his rod. 

No more, as such, from heaven Satan falls. 



158 MAN'. 

Eveu the Missionary Brotherhood 

Enjoined on its Evangelists^ that where 

They could not Christianize, to humanize ; 

For all, who taught the Truth, were held insi)ired. 

The published meetings, to protest against 

The Dispossession of the Church of Eome 

ATere countermanded, for the callers now 

Eemembered, 'twas no heritage from Christ, 

Since even by the Papa 'twas confessed, 

His proper seat would be Jerusalem. 

The Protestants too from their Schema dropped 

All articles, save that of right and due 

Of private judgment to construe the Book, 

And that, which the offender relegates 

Unto the Spirit, to redeem himself. 

No more, like spiritual cannibals, 

If Moses stood not sponsor at their font, 

Professors of their offspring made a mess, 

To feast with self-invited Ignorance ; 

Sleek counsellors, also, for the first time blushed. 

As they rellected, with what sorry grace 

Themselves could serve on Eeason through the week, 

When, on its first, they at her slighting winked. 

1^0 more the rich objected to be taxed. 

To humanize the offspring of the poor. 

Aware, that Man's Intelligence not dropped, 

Like heaven's dew, to bless his earth's estate. 

Which draws its value, not from brutes, but Man. 

And then, as high beyond that Paradise 

The Peiinon in the Empyrean bore 

The legend : 'Through Humanity to God, ' 

The rich no longer feigned, in their bequests, 

The grave's credentials to the world beyond ; 

But on compeers now smiled the Shade of him, 

Who, like the moon, stands dearer to mankind, 

For being nearer, than those greater lights. 

Which, for their distance, are not cared of Man ; 

And with Peabody, Conrad Poppenhusen, 

James Lenox, Peter Cooper, Eobert Burns 

And Benjamin Kichardson now through their boons, 

xVs lasting niches, won the heart of Man. 

Yea, then — O, Bond of ease to parting souls ! 

The parents' hearts broke not before their eyes, 

With dread, their orphans would be castaways. 

Thus wrought his lore, and then no soul so light. 

But she would gravitate to equity : 

In his own deeds Man found the hidden spring 

Of failure and success, and conscious now, 

That he must shoulder his own proper load, 

ISTo more did simulate humility, 



MAy. 159 

And strut in suuctimouy ; then Eeligion, 

Instead consoling Man but for his death, 

Taught him, to look upon God given life 

As no atonement, and no sacrifice, 

But as a blest enjoyment of the All, 

Directed by that Keason He bestowed ; 

Hence the inscription : ^ To our children' waned 

In frequency upon the graveyard slabs ; 

Xor more that crime of fashion outraged God, 

But children were once more the household gems ; 

Then Man, ere sx^eaking, questioned with himself, 

If what he would express, came from within f 

For in the ecstasy of honesty, 

Man with his fellow dealt, with present thought. 

That both hereafter might confront again. 

And all, who had been promised, pondered well. 

That though the City, Xew^ Jerusalem 

Be paved with gold, yet even in its streets. 

The passer may need help of stranger Saint. 

Thus individual Conscientiousness 

Bore her reflexion on the nation's whole, 

That felt, such fate would fall, as it deserved : 

All parties for the country's happiness 

And glory strove in concert, and diverged 

But in their course, to vie, which could do best ; 

Yea, then those worms— miraculous to tell ! 

For want of nourishment, though not all dead 

Were shrivelled, as they were but skeletons ! 

Then too, that public Tongue, so sloughy erst. 

Had turned as ruddy as Aurora's sheen. 

And owned no more that lilushless hardihood, 

To palter with the people's confidence, 

And realize from lozel candidates 

And brazen peculating officers^ 

From charters and from bribe won patronage ; 

But truly now the peo])]e*s Sentinel, 

It would accord to every honest Man 

Opposed in politics, an equal praise. 

It erst reserved but for its party friends, 

Aware, the country could no more aiford 

Detraction of those rarest public men ; 

No more, the President did bolt his door 

Against his very friends, who charges of 

Corruption brought against his partisans ; 

But conscious now, he was a nation's liend, 

Not mere purveyor of a. party pack, 

He spurned the slav'ring tongues of parasites, 

And i)atrouaged no more for second term, 

But trusting to the Country's gratitude. 

He, through a circular, had notified 



160 MAN. 

All his appoiiileeSj both the old aucl new, 

That first of charge, vouched by an honest Man, 

Would hear its echo from their vacant place. 

Then he reDiembered, not on gravelled course, 

I3id nations run their race, for even then, 

Germania with Columbia strove and vied, 

To gain the foremost in the nations' lead : 

Yea, t'was a noble struggle to behold ! 

All others, that were entered on the list, 

Had fallen lag, and from competitors. 

Became spectators of this champion test ; 

Then through those Shades, who wrought for Man in life. 

The great Congratulation made its round. 

That Man now harvested, vvhat they had sown ; 

The Manes too, of Greece and Kome looked on, 

xlnd whispered : 'These shall both excel our time !• 

Divided was the gaze strained TTniverse, 

Which one should finally bear off the palm : 

They, wlio judged more by heart, with lusty cheers, 

Inspirited youth flushed Columbia ; 

While they, who arbitrated by their head, 

Would nod to sturdy, staid Germania. 

With Tiistian the predilection hung, 

In even balance, as decision erst 

Between his motlier's and his grandam's love ; 

Althougli he rather cast, that force of youth 

Would to Columbia secure the prize, 

The more, since now was cured that Southern boil, 

Whicli, with its blackened flow, had helped to speed, 

The turning of hei- bod,v's blood to ])us. 

Then too, as on those meadows in the West. 

The fire, in autumn, overlen]>.s a creek ; 

So 'cross the sea the lore v>\ Tristian 

To Europe sprang, and of its countless IVuits 

These are but specimens : J n Albion 

Its block of ice was broken into crumbs, 

To mix invigorating draughts for them, 

Who, chilleil by Eank, were patients raving in 

Their fever, Indigen(»e ; In Germany 

The people and their governments v»^ere one, 

The latter yielding where the former asked ; 

Her phrase was dropped by France, who now had tbund. 

That, though domestic blood might irrigate 

Her Freedom's tree, 'twould so imbue its stock. 

That it could teem vv^th but abliorrent fruit. 

Unwonted, too, from ^Uistria was heard 

The ' Present, ' as by Time the roll was called. 

In few, though arms were not to rest for aye, 

No nation would her rival trip through war. 

But on the equal footing, Peace vouchsafes, 



MAN, 161 

All those, to rearward, soiiglit to gain the head. 

But why relate, what has affected all ? 

And yet these wondrous feats were brought about, 

By naught of effort to exterminate, 

^or even to expel, the Bad in Man, 

But merely, by subordinating it 

To Good ; first in the individual Man, 

And then, through him, within the commonwealth; 

For deem not, Tristian had over.weened, 

To tamper with that first dividing line 

'Tween Good and Adverse, through creation drawn. 

Thus Tristiau'S mission rose on what he reared, 

Aud Man waxed true, as he conversed with Truth. 

But oh ! for that Perversity of Man ! 

They, who in sorrow for that Eden Fall 

Had broke their hearts, nov,- them again, with grief, 

Together heaved, because there had been none ! 

And though, by not one drop of martyr- s blood 

The Truth w^as stained, and neither 3Iater broke. 

When strained by Keason, which its lore evolved ; 

Yea, though of spinsters not the most devout 

A moment sooner cut her thread of life. 

Because this earth was not a vale of woe. 

Yet do not deem, the strokes, which raised his work, 

In oue harmonious echo sounded back : 

For often Discord groaned from grated Wont, 

Whose dissonance from these few clamors hear : 

'Flee Youth ! a serpent lurks amongst the herbs : ' 

Here Tristian thought, how blest that Eoman bard, 

Who never knew that worm in Paradise ; 

'We boldly challenge this Man, Tristian 

To tell the world the cause of growing grass.' 

To which he chuckling answered to himself : 

Though, when the germ was planted first in earth, 

I was not more, than that essayist there, 

Yet do I know, what seeming he forgot. 

That bigger blade will spring from fatter soil ; 

'We greatly question, whether Tristian 

In heart believes, there is a bodied God !' 

Then he lamented in that very heart. 

For in that theologian had been spoiled 

The great'st anatomist, that could have been : 

For he'd have told, how long and thick the arms, 

That rounded off this earth, the sun and stars ; 

'There stands in his defiant attitude. 

Cased in the sev'n times sev'n fold panoply 

Of incredulity, that bold, bad Man.' 

But hold, the hold was writ, the bad was thought, 

For he, in being, to the world was known j 

Yet still ignored Delusion's trick of phrase : 



162 MA 2^. 

Such cries, lie felt, knew not eternity, 

And what was writ, was scribbled bat on air. 

Yet of all missiles, from all quarters aimed, 

There was a one, which ever hit his soul. 

As open still to thought, as lixed therein : 

It was, that though his lore was adequate 

For all requirements of Man's present life. 

Yet there it dimmed, and left him in the dark 

Of what there was beyond ! This in his lore, 

Else perfect, bared a flaw, whose ceaseless draught 

Blew on his fiery soul a fitful chill, 

And he resolved to staunch it, once for all. 

Alas ! essaying it, he felt too soon 

His Mentbr's lack, and sore repented then, 

That, like a gladsome schoolboy sent to fair. 

Who lost his errant in its novelties. 

He was diverted by the eartly ken 

From urging on his guest, at large, that quest. 

For whose disclosure sore, by fits, he yearned 5 

Yet though his chief was gone, his lore remained, 

As part of him, and he intensely felt. 

It owned the clue, but how to glean it forth % 

Still try he must, when, in the method taught. 

Thus groped the student where he was not shown : 

' I've got so far in lore, that were this earth 

Of His creation all, I could outline 

The Deity like in a silhouette ; 

But, as siie is thereto, Avhat sandgrain is 

Unto the beach, my adumbration fails. — 

I now own life, yet if I were endowed 

With length of years, to be earth's oldest Man, 

There comes the time, when I must give it up. 

And in exchange shall get, Avhat Death may yield ! 

It now is night, and how, Avere I to die — 

This very moment ? Then, Avhat in the next ? 

There lies the line, as narrow as a breath, 

And yet as Avide, as that Eteruity ! 

I now am here, and in the bodj^ thus ; 

But where, and what, Avhen ousted of this hold '? 

]S^aught recks that nice incline, by Avhich a soul 

Is tossed to heaven, or slid doAvn to hell ; 

The Resurrection of the body, and 

Tliat Judgment I>ay ! What comfort can they giA'O ? 

What can they answer, granted they were true, 

And not a fetch, to substitute for thought ? 

AVhat, though I feigned, the Avorld shall come to end. 

That, then, this soul and body shall rejoin ? 

Yet, where and what, the gap unknown, between 

This certain Present, and that doubtful Then? 

]My soul, I cannot palter with thy quest : 



MA 2f. 163 

Thou wilt be quieted with nothing less, 

Than knowing-, when thon from this body shift'st 

What then be thy location, and thy state ! 

Thy shell stays here, a ghastly, crumbling hulk. 

Whose ribs, my bones, perhaps a factory 

Shall grind, to fertilize, wiiere now^ I stand ! 

This do I know, or else know not I live ; 

IJnt Soul ! Shalt thou, too, fall to nothingness f 

Or.canst thou, substance loosend, being ow^n ? 

Yea, if thou canst, not I shall reck its miss, 

Who crave not being for the body's sake. — 

My brain is, as it were, to lightning bonnd. 

As it, Oh Soul ! explores thy after state, 

Thy fixed abode, for all eternity ! 

All too contracted is this narrow earth, 

To room thy like, who throngh the Portal pass ; 

And in thy migratory, star bent tlight, 

— At giddier distance, than thou car'st to scan — 

The nearest station is yond friended Moon, 

Which can bnt, as an inn, accommodate, 

Xot harbor, as a home, the 'lighting guest : 

And then the Sun — were even h^ not fire — 

The fixed and wand'ring stars — though rooms immense, 

So far away, that only Hope can scan 

The ciphers' row, bnt not the distance' stretch ! 

Yet, even, Soul, if thon hadst laid behind 

That drear, stupendous void between this old 

And other home, canst thou, for second life. 

Then slip into a ready, native form ; 

Or if yond spheres are also i)eoi>led rooms. 

Will not the sev'ral bodies rather have 

Their own congenital pre-occupants ? — 

Here, like a Steamer on the Western Streams, 

Which in in^oud onward strikes a sndden halt, 

And then is pased, by what it overridj 

So Tristian's presentiment of death. 

That, had so far coursed smoothly, stopt abrupt. 

And fast was pent, by what it compassed erst. 

Relief he would not seek for well he knew, 

That never one, of all who made the flight, 

Before or after sketched the route he went, 

And that no chart the Where, that staid him, showed. 

Had then that Anchor steadied his heart, 

It would have dragged, and snapped its sheeted flukes, 

Which wonld have sunk into that Bottomless : 

But, it he erst did for the Spirit yearn, 

He now^ for him did groan ; yea, had then been 

The Spirit, or himself, else than they were, 

He would have wished, ho had for ever staid. 

Or had not come at all ! then, he'd have prayed, 



164 MAK. 

That Faith, not Thought had filled his soul j ye, he'd 

Have feigned he'd try to learn how to i^iofess, 

Though 'twere, to worship the Divinity 

In cat or ox, ay even in that Kneph ; 

Or, all these failing, still to trust a. Man ! 

But sooth to say, in her eternal stress, 

His soul would never with distraction sliake, 

For she too firmly in his lore was held • 

And still he hoped, therin to find that clue. 

But, when self silenced to the world he hushed, 

As crows, upon the ebb, will dark again 

That beach they fled, before the trumbliug tide ; 

So now, from their T)rostration, rallied forth 

Most theologians, who had erst succumbed. 

Had he retracted, or had he renounced ? 

^0 — for he had not even qualified, 

Or, modulated, by a semi breve, 

That tune, wherein this Age her echo heard. 

And yet, his enemies trumphaut sent 

These tidings through the circuit of the globe : 

" Woe has befallen him, who dared to shake 

His puny arm against the Lord himself ! 

Old Satan, bodied in the form of lore. 

As he was trapping for the world once more. 

Has been detected in the very act 

Of bagging, thief like, our ancestral faith ! — 

Columbia her grand Centennial 

Of Independence will anticipate. 

And merge it now into the Jubilee 

Of her Eedemption from a second Fall, 

And she invites, throughout the universe, 

The poor in Spirit, and the trodden down, 

Her Celebration to participate. — 

The Lord, now in our Constitution, stands 

Acknowledged, and devoutly we expect. 

That he, in turn, will own the compliment, 

And will, with his divine legation, bless 

Us in the person of the Holy Ghost, 

Who now is looked for in the Trinity, 

Or in that little, round the corner Church : 

When we have got him, we shall let you know. 

From Behring's strait, down to the Eio Grande, 

When Man meets Man, the only two salutes 

Are now to ^ Watch and pray', and ' Feed my laaibs ;' 

Send all the she]3herds you can spare, the crooks 

Grow on our soil, the hounds we raise ourselves. " 

The staid throughout the earth remarked : '' 'Tis plain, 

Columbia has gone, to gather wool ; 

She to Confucius and Socrates, 

Has had the third, and thus she dresses him. " 



MAI^. 165 

But Tristian fully understood, AvLat meant 

The Spirit, when he called Columbia frail ; 

And hoping only, in her case, Eelapse 

Would lack its doom, loth with the crazy din, 

He knew, that elsewhere was a sober calm, 

And seeking that, he gave his soul's farewell. 

But took no pass-port from Columbia. 

The Continental Universities 

Saluted him, and said, he came in time : 

That in the middle Ages, Germany 

Had only by Rome's inspiration moved : 

But now, when she w^as dominant once more. 

She was resolved, her Genius should rule, 

And now, the issue had been made with Borne 

On dogma of Infallibility ; 

That he the host of her Intelligence 

Should lead against the might of Ignorance. 

They urged, that Bismark and the Kaiser were 

Upon that sea by policy becalmed. 

And if but from his quarter blew the breeze, 

The.y both could for the homeport make again. 

This fell upon the mind of Tristian, 

As would the sad request on General, 

That he establish peace in civil strife, 

Amongst that vevj foe, he had subdued. 

But Tristian to these pastors then returnej:!. 

That all their flocks were straying, not indeed 

Into the corn, but even to his lore ; 

As to their chieftains, he reminded them, 

'Twas counter to the eagle, he should sing. 

They understood his hint, and then confessed. 

That, by his lore, that strife was won, ere fought ; 

And that it hence, should be the supplement. 

If not the substitute for something, which 

They designated in a language dead. — 

Then, for the restoration of himself, 

Who felt Time's tread, as 'twere upon his head. 

Of all the spots on earth, he sought the where. 

To his beginning he would join his end. 

But Oh, how throed his breast, for what it missed ! 

Yea, loudest clamors that, what's never spoke : 

Thou, Man, who now beholdst the universe. 

Imagine what it were without the sun. 

And thou shalt ken, hov^' in the Spirit's lack 

That Soul was dark, which else had been a light. — 

How Man's Within, and all the world's Without 

Are like two mirrors, standing opposite, 

Beflecting, each in each, their portraiture ! 

How, when the soul is misted, but a blur 

Shows Nature's face, though by Midsummer flushed j 



ICG MAIiT, 

While, to the hcdeyoii iiiiiid the pebble glints, 
•As diamond ! But now, as Kature's hand 
His tnrmoiled breast, into eomposnre stroked, 
He through his spokesman, Memory, commnned 
Serenely with all, his eyes beheld, 
As restless he acclomb that watershed. 
Which Europe's currents parts, to East iind West: 
There, where his Childhood feigned, the highway ridged, 
Whereon Fame's pageant passed in cavalcade. 
Like blast-capt Mounts, still westward hung those clouds, 
Which erst had typified to him the broil, 
Whose fill was lately emptied to the dregs; 
And though he kenned, what then they sucked anew, 
Their shadow passed his mind, where onlj staid 
The contemplation of that Power, who 
Had taught the bee, that buzzed by him, to know, 
When she must urge, and when withhold her sting. 
Yea, as he scanned the ants, who sundered 'most 
Their sectioned bodies, tugging to secure 
Their heavier eggs, for but to give them life. 
And then thought of the hosts^ who, in like tile. 
Had toiled along that road, with battleax 
Or slumb'ring iJeath, that Avaited but for touch, 
To roaring rush, he asked : *' For what is this ? 
For what is AlF?" but ansNver found he none. — 
A little from that highway, now so grown. 
That happy raven pair owned it their home. 
Still stood the pine, beneath whose cosy spread, 
He had espied the yellow hammer's nest. 
When, jogging with his mother to the fair, 
He scarcely was to JMan of worthier note, 
Than was that sprout : now, by his lore, his name 
Was quickened into universal bruit. 
[Jpon a juniper, across the road. 
The gilded songster poured his plaintive throat, 
Which prompted Tristian to meditate, 
How like he might have been descended from 
That happy progeny, which nestled then ? 
But quick, officious Sorrow broke upon 
His revery, and warned, tliat they were dead. 
From whom himself had sprung," and he forbore, 
When neared two knapsacked,\vand'ring journeymen. 
Who, from his portrait, extant everywhere, 
Quick recognizing Tristian, doft'ed their caps. 
And, when beyond his hearing, Avhispered one 
To other : " Comrade, how the fatherland, 
In peace would yet outdo her war's exploits. 
Did he but speak ! " These did not know, that he 
Learnt silence there, where too much speech is taught. 
But do not marvel, as these wand'rers did, 



MAN. 167 

To find liini isolated in those wilds, 
For they, who would their recreation quaff 
From Nature's breast, must to the nipple take, 
And here was Tristian's original. 
The summer's vesper sun now weirdly streaked. 
In fitful glimmer through that forest dome, 
When, inly moved, he trod its solemn aisles, 
Until arrested by the ice fresh fount, 
Whose wooden stock, and basined rock still stood, 
To cheer his manhood, as it often had 
His infancy, and as he then, so now 
For cooling, shyly neared a rustic child. 
Which, like himself, when he was of its age. 
Through gathering sticks, did on bilberries feast. 
As he his childhood there reflected saw. 
His Then and Now were blended into one, 
And all the Interim seemed but a blank. 
Like he was then, he gladdened now the child, 
And had already asked its father's name, 
W^hen he was startled by the tiutt'ring u]) 
Of ravens near. He questioued it what drew, 
Of them such flock, rare there, where they abound, 
But did not see the poor child choke with griel. 
When eased in tears, he from its stammering gleaned, 
Its father failed his trust, in manner like. 
As erst that Parish messenger had done ; 
That he, an outlawed fugitive, had sought 
A refuge in that forest, where itself 
Had smuggled to him what of fbod it could, 
Until detected by the officers ; 
And that, thus hunted down, its father starved. 
Where yonder ravens gnawed his skeleton ! 
He asked his name : It was his gooseherd mate I 
He from the stricken infant dried the tears, 
Assuring it, it should no father lack. 
And then, alone, relapsed into his wont. 
As he remembered, that his iated mate 
Had sat beside him, in that afternoon. 
When-first that Shadow fell upon his soul. 
And asked of him, how long the Serpent was '? 
He mused and cast, where now abode the soul, 
Which animated once yond comrade's bones ? 
Yet as before, he now was balked again 5 
Then seemed to him his lore, like to a house, 
AVhich, for the lack of roof, is but the sport 
Of th'elements, to tear and wreck at aviU. 
. He blamed himself, that in liis eagerness 
To know this life, he learnt not what's beyond. 
Thus goaded by the sting of self reproof. 
Ho hastened fiist to the alternatives, 



168 MAN. 

To let Ms life its circle there contract, 

Or that he'd marshal Man, throughout the globe, 

To shout one universal shriek to God, 

That tantalized, Man would conspire and stop, 

To procreate, for his creation's end, 

Unless He through the Spirit deigned to give 

A Eevelation, positive, to Man, 

For fixed assurance of his after state ! 

Like nearing thunder in his soul it rolled : 

A Eevelation, Eevelation give ! 

As like resembles like, yet is not one -, 

So similar Avas the sensation, which 

Xow of a sudden quickened Tristian, 

To what he felt upon that visit erst ; 

And, as aroused by iSTature's pristine touch 

His soul was braced for her eternal cast : 

*' That I am heie, apprises Tristian, 

All was provided what has come to pass, 

For of thy destined whole, 'tis but a part, 

And Eevel at ion's not thy sum of all : 

Behold ! Where art thou "? Eecollect thyself; 

ISTot gotten of this forest, nor thyself, 

This epileptic Phrensy fell on thee'; 

But, as the virus from infected soil. 

Once in the body lodged, yet nonetheless 

In healthy land, breaks into pestilence ; 

So thou the semoi of this revery 

Hadst gendered in thee by Columbia, 

And here it is developed, as thou seest. 

But now it recks not, whence thou took'st this fit : 

Enough, that seeming, thine's that common plight. 

Which hankers lor a Eevelation still. 

I'll say, that like a craft, my lore has been 

Far too unwieldy for thy pilotage ; 

Thus, in the sheer it took, thou ranst aground ; 

But doft' the novice, and the master don, 

Then heed, as I delineate thy chart : 

The start conditions, whether onward is 

A forward too : reverse an engine's arm, 

And it moves backward -, turn^but as thou standst. 

And all is then before, what was behind ; 

Thus with the Eeason, which I taught to thee : 

Hadst thou but started right, instead returned 

To thy first setting out, thou'dst have attained. 

Where Eeason would have shown thee, that it is. 

Against Go<rs Eeason, that mankind from Him 

Should have the Eevelation, which they crave :, 

If Man must needs, let him believe, and hope 

Beyond his Eeason's reach, but never aught, 

Which counters to it; for upon it turn 



MAN. 169 

The Maker and His All. Hence let mankind 

— If else, they'd still insist— compassionate 

Their own Creator, that not even He 

May be unreasonable. jSTever fear, 

That thou thy Keason couldst abuse, for what 

Thou'dst feign as such, were Eeason then no more. 

As neither her abuse, so her nonuse 

Xot Eeason knows. God never makes a gift, 

Without the fixed condition of its use 5 

Of whose fnlfillment He assures Himself, 

By giving Man the spur to use : take heed, 

The gift is simulated, when this lacks. 

I will not palter with thy studious soul. 

By telling thee, that God would give to Man 

His Revelation, were it good for him ; 

Nor shall I cram with plausibilities 

Thy hung'ring soul j but, as I shall not force 

What seems propitious, so I'll neither shirk, 

What is by Man as adverse held 5 and thus. 

As by her own accord, I'll guide thy soul 

To the conviction, that, for Man to have 

A certain Eevelation from his God, 

Were 'gainst that very Eeason I have taught : 

Behold the sky : Imagine, thou readst there 

In letters, manifest, as yonder sun, 

What Man would know, and then reflect at will, 

For what, upon this earth, he thence would live ? 

T^Tot for his soul, which, having naught to seek, 

Could but decay, since idleness is death. 

To pamper but his body, then would be 

His only care, which were no more than sleep. 

Yea, were All known, then Time itself would cease 5 

For there were nothing left for Time to do ; 

But think : wouldst thou ascribe less wisdom of 

Economy to God, than to a Man, 

Who will not run his mill, when lacking grain ? 

Thus well reflect, there follows, every hour, 

A w^hole Eternity, which would be wrought. 

The gap thou madest thyself, and fellst therein, 

Was, that thou in my lore forgotst the hints, 

Which I intended, as it were, for seed. 

And not as shot-up plants. Hadst thou but conned 

What I of change and motion erst have taught, 

Thou wouldst have owned the key, that can unlock 

All temporal and spiritual lore, 

Which wanting, Knowledge stays a mystery. 

That but resounds the voice, Conjecture speaks. 

Infer not, Tristian, although thy kind 

Have risen to this present culture's height, 

By slow gradation, and with many slips, 



170 MAl^, 

From brute's eouditiou, that there was a time, 

When his Creator's eye was turned on Man, 

jj^Tow more averted, or now more inclined : 

Thou understandst, why individual Man 

Is ushered into life a helpless babe. 

Instead as an adult. This principle 

Is with the species all identical. 

Which, also, in an infant state has been 

Created, and not m maturity, 

That 'tween the two, it cultivate itself. 

Mankind have not yet known, and shall not know 

The state, they highest deem, but what beyond 

Still lies another one : If they could halt, 

In what is fabled as their golden Age, 

Then change, which would undo it, needs must cease ; 

But change is the condition of mankind. 

Since Man, without it, would be nothing more. 

Than an eternal, palsied idiot, 

AYho could not stir, in body, or in soul, 

Since least of deed or thought effects a change. 

Thus, Tristian, as divining thou conceiv'st 

The hights of progress, Man shall restless scale. 

Thou needst not sorrovr, that thyself canst not 

Be thither borne upon those Ages' heave : 

For if thy Spirit's freedom thou maintaiu. 

As well within, as outside of the pale. 

Which every Age has staked for its domain. 

Then thou, preceeding, shalt be there at home, 

Where yet those after Ages must attain j 

For, as from first of all accounted time, 

There have been souls, to whom the lUTsent time 

Would be familiar, as was their own ; 

So, in a hundred centuries i)ast thine, 

There shall be some, who in the world will be 

As closely blind, as in their mother's vromb. 

Yea, Tristian. more than I teach thee now. 

The first knew not ,nor shall the last, that lives. 

This argument, as pertinent to All, 

Gainst Eevelation proper, too applies : 

If Man had promised him another life, 

lie, by neglect, would wrong this present one ; 

Then,'furtiiermore, would have to be described 

The soul's abode, when i^arted from this life : 

Say, Man, what warrant canst thou give thyself, 

That, with they Future, were it known to thee, 

Though it were Heaven, thou'dst be satisfied % 

And though at one, how at all other times ?" 

^' Yea Spirit, thou but speakst the primal Truth: 

Had I but thought of New Jerusalem, 

And all that nonsense in th' Apocalypse, 



MAN. 171 

1 sliould uut have for Revelatiou called. " 

'* God's work is real, and so stupendous vast, 

As tboii in thousand lives couldst not exhaust , 

Hence there's no need, to feiga that which is not. 

Revealed, or not revealed, no fabling makes 

What God has not provided for mankind : 

Of g-eins, Man fabricates the base himself^ 

The genuine are but in nature found, 

And Man's no beast ot* burden to be lured. 

By painted fodder to perform his task. 

See, thus preposterous it were, if Man 

Should be diverted from this present lite, 

By contemplation of another one, 

For which, thereby, he were indeed uiitir. 

As he for manhood is least qualitied. 

Who did anticipate its state in youth^ 

And he's most blest, in his senility, 

Who, in his infancy, lived bat as cliild. 

If Man, to-day, did his to-morrow know. 

And, in his teems, what is his sixties' state. 

So v>^ere he sure, in lite, of what's beyond 

Man would be gelded of his spur to do. 

Know thus, how for His own economy, 

God must forbear, to manifest Himselt* 

In manner, as sheer Ignorance implores ; 

But must allot its working out to Man, 

Who, what lie feels and fancies of his God 

Imparts to Man, which thence, is called revealed : 

What he of truth declares, himself makes not, 

?vIore than the Jurist does that equity. 

Whose principles he but enunciates. 

Man tlie Unknown but from the Known can learn ; 

The Future from the Present ; hence the gifts 

Of Inspiration and of Propliecy. 

That God permits the founders of the creeds, 

Which have prevailed at various times on earth, 

To call themselves His Prophets, Servants, Sous, 

Ueveals His magnitude, and to what height 

He gives his license unto Man to climb. 

But Tristian, Man might as soon return 

CTnto the breast, that nourished him, a babe, 

As deem, to draw the knowledge of his God, 

But from what Ages taught, that only knew 

The million and a half time larger sun, 

'Vo be to earth, as lantern to a house : 

Xo wonder thou couldst never own a creed, 

Which cannot even fill this petty earth, 

Since not the universe too big for thee : 

Or do I overcredit thee in grasp I 

Wouldst thou, to comprehend them, have the sun. 



172 MAN, 

And countless stats be less, than what they are '? 

Yea, wouldst thou, Heaven were so near to thee, 

As is the canopy above thy bed ? 

Thou knowst, mere puppet Man would be, if God 

Were his immediate Sovereign—and yet 

Thou'dst have, that He, in person, ruled the earth ? 

Doest covet to be of his Courtiers one, 

Thou who, by nature, shun'st all coteries ■ 

Consider how this were, and then compare. 

If the creations of that ancient Greek, 

And modern Briton were more dear to thee, 

Were they portrayed more in biography ? 

Thus, Man, as froin their books, thou best knowst these ; 

So con thy God, but from His Work and Rule : 

From these thou canst attain His magnitude. 

As from the Shadow thou the substance scan'st. 

Then if, to understand thy God, instead 

Belittling Him, thou doest expand thy soul, 

Thou' It own, that not this universe, nor He, 

Who owns it, could be less, than what they are. 

But who take God, as He by Man is feigned. 

Will never know, or feel Him as He is. 

Yet thou wouldst know of thy eternal life ? 

Though there lives not upon the earth the Man , 

Who better comprehends eternity. 

Than thou, who art not like the frivolous French, 

To whom, in banishing their dynasties, 
Eternity means but some twenty years ; 
Nor like the multitude, who speak the word, 
AVhereas, their soul partakes not of its sense : 
Yet hast thou ever scanned, how irail a base 
This life affords, to found eternity ? 
I pass the right of Mai], to ask for it. 
Reminding thee, if but a ghost should cbance 
Across his way, Man would not try on him 
Solicitation, but would fain obey 
Whatever courteous waffc he-d deign to him : 
Yet thou, my human friend, wouldst overween, 
That God can either be constrained, or won. 
By whatsoever Man may do on earth, 
To give him life, lor all eternity, 
If not in His design ? Or doest thou deem^ 
That He will give it thee, by special grace. 
As Kings were wont by tlieir : 'We will it so'? 
Thinkst thou Him fickle, as mere mortal iNhiu, 
To waver in opinion, or to change 
His first decree ? But Tristian be eased : 
As thou hast found this life correct — and 'tis 
But Ignorance mistakes it otherwise — 
Thou hast assurance of thy after state : 



MAN. 173 

Yea, Ti'istiaii, all, what I've so far adduced, 

Is but, as 'twere a semblance to my next, 

From which depend all Faith and Doubt, for aye ; 

It is this question, which we'll now confront : 

Are the Creator, and the universe 

A Fraud upon mankind, or are they not ? 

Behold ! and see the answer with thy eyes ; 

Yea, in thy inward, the solution feel. " 

" Thou, Benefactor, indispensable ! 

Had I no sight, and only heard one tenth 

Of what, in they return, I have been blest ; 

Had I the power to design or change 

The physical and spiritual All, 

As I reflect, with Keason's utmost stretch, 

I would not make it else, than what it is. " 

" Then do not fear, where All's provided well, 

That but to Man default should have been made. 

Behold God's work, and tremble in thy hold. 

With ecstasy, that thou art part thereof j 

And ever do remember, when thou diest. 

Thou Shalt not pass from out this universe, 

But still remain in thy Creator's hands : 

It is as naught to Him, if He sees fit. 

To give thee life, through His eternity. 

As it has been, to give this present one ; 

Life is a substance, not a shadow : know 

Thou art ! Life must be, and, as for this life, 

Thou wast unaiding, thy assistance too 

Will not be needed for the future state. 

Perform the duty, which thou ow'st to God : 

It is to pay, in w^hat thou'rt held to Him, 

For giving thee this life. How this is done, 

None asks who means to do, but only he. 

Who'd juggle with himself. This lite does teach, 

That, as the path unto the parents' heart 

Leads through their children ; so the up to God 

Lies through the kinkness to our fellow men : 

Thy God, thy kind and His Creation love, 

And thou art blest for aye ; for be assured, 

As Man shall audit thy account, the Father 

Thy voucher shall acknowledge. He has tied 

With his Creation this Eeligion's bond, 

And 'twill outlast the change of Church and Creed, 

Which are proportioned to Eternity, 

Less than the seasons' fashion to thy life : 

The vestment falls, the Spirit will remain. 

If instead loving, thou didst deprecate. 

This goodly earth, as part the universe, 

— Whose friendship is not enmity to God — 

Thou either wert a fool, or hypocrite, 



174 MAH^. 

xVud equal wurlli of pity tlirougli thy life. 

God's Justice tliou hast proved, whenever tried : 

'Tis but the Adverse gives to Good its worth ; 

Yet there is on this earth but part the Bad, 

Of what is feigued, and of the latter's bulk, 

The most arises from diversity 

Ot times and things : Celibaey, to day, 

To morrow. Marriage is an evil deemed. 

If Man were angel, still, the first were best, 

The lowest but the worst. That what thou lik'sl. 

Is ever good, what varies from it, ill ; 

ret, if his humors Man could realize, 

A hundred others by the change were wronged. 

Again, there is antagonism ^tween 

The individual and fellow Man, 

For every one must for himself jiro vide : 

Though Man of Man's shortcomings still complain 

Yet, in his haste to diarge, let him bethink. 

If Might would answer Will, Man would not be 

In i)romise rich, and in performance poor. 

]^or yet JS'ecessity an Evil deem, 

Which to Man's weakness is indigenous. 

As Yirtue springs from strength of character; 

But, of all crimes, which Man on Man commits, 

The main pricks grow from liis brutality. 

And his dishonesty : It is the care 

Of Discipline to raise him from the first : 

And that he not into the hitter fall, 

He has his Conscience for a guardian. 

Unless he cut his tie with God and Man. - 

If BOW for Eevelation still thou yearnst, 

Then of thy Ileason dispossess thyself, 

And take thy fdl, of what shall offer lirst." 

^' Oil. ask me rather what I would not crave, 

So thou, thereon, wilt deign to come again I 

Yet, Spirit, more, and do not aughfc withhold, 

For now thou'st lighted my immortal ilarae."' 

" Yea, Tristian, even therefor I've returned, 

xVud yet for more, since now the time has come, 

Tiiat I thy mission should impart to thee : 

Hadst thou been ripe, and had not lain between 

That errant, I'd have done so ere I left : 

It is, that thou shalt promulgate my lore. 

Throughout the globe: Such is the Spirit's will, 

And thy authority, know, Tristian, 

Is even such, as better none has owned. 

All what thou didst, has but a prelude been 

Unto that epoch, thou'lt inaugurate. 

Thy stay shall be myself, for I'll abide. 

And in this .forest shall commune with thee. 



MA N. 175 

Too long has Man for but Delusion died, 

'Tis time, that now he should live for the Truth ! 

As an estate, delapidated by 

Mismanagement, is entered by its heir, 

Eesolved to press a better husbandry ; 

So is this passing Age succeeded by 

The nearing one, whose Genius is iixed. 

That it shall not assume the old's abase. 

Yet, that thyself be not unconscious, like 

A wheelarm, knowing not, to where shall tend 

The charge thou forcest on, hear once for all. 

The burden of thy mission is, to fill 

The gap, that steep divides the Atheism 

That nears, from the Delusion which recedes : 

For though, thou well conceiv-st, how even God 

By some of Man may be disowned, denied; 

Thou understand'St, without my telling thee, 

That for the kind, such is not His design. 

Without ado, address thee to thy task. 

And in its carriage hence, until thy death, 

Thy prototype in yonder eagle know, 

Who hither, at his ease, soars from the Alps, 

But ne'er descends, save for necessity. 

Thou'lt gently open the hostilities 

On Error, by projecting in its fort, 

This question : > Did the Savior know that Fall 

In Paradise, to have been real, or feigned ? 

And then, as Man decides, let him deduce. 

This cast will raze the false excrescences. 

Whilst stays its stock of Truth, to lasting bloom. 

Thereon, who now oppose, vshali be thy friends : 

Take heart! Thou bearst an Era on thy soul ; 

We part for now ; thou'lt find me ever here." 

"• So thou uphold me, be the world arrayed ! 

For more than thou, no Spirit yet prevailed. — 

Though, where he shall be born, no Man may clioose ; 

He may elect where he shall l>reathc his last : 

Yond where I entered, I shall pass from life, 

And here, Avhere we did me<it, my lasting Best, 

Which I approach as mariner his port. 

Who's more contented, as tbe more he nears. " 

As never noon to midnight oi)posite, 

That soul, which to the Ibrest bade farewell, 

Was to that soul, which had the welcome heaved. 

Then to the world again spoke Tristian, 

And Man, to hear him, on his tip-toe stood. 



THE END. 



176 



MAN, 



ERRA.T^. 



Page 



4 


Line 37 


For 


ivhich Read 


while 


5 


14 


" 


The7i 


Thou 


12 


2 


•' 


muark " 


murk 


18 


" 24 


" 


fail 


fall 


18 


41 


" 


rapid " 


vapid 


21 


22 


" 


vanguished " 


vanquished 


21 


" 43 


" 


distillation " 


destination 


23 


10 


" 


theio 


they 


31 


" 22 


" 


the 


thee 


32 


10 


" 


althought " 


although 


32 


27 


" 


relive 


relieve 


33 


7 


" 


Whence' 


%vhence 


33 


37 


" 


attritutes " 


attributes 


34 


20 


" 


snn 


sun 


34 


28 


" 


thou't " 


thoult 


34 


• 37 


" 


righli/ 


rightly 


34 


45 


" 


but 


but 


35 


34 




landation '■ 


laudation 


36 


9 


" 


spouses " 


spouses 


40 


46 


'• 


wherewith " 


ivhere with 


42 


11 


the comma after through place before it 


43 


24 


insert hav& between ^vou 


Id and deianed 


46 


29 


put 


comma instead period after afar 


46 


48 


For 


had Bead 


hand 


47 


" 25 


" 


wave " 


wane 


47 


30 


•' 


mandlcind " 


mankind 


4J 


•' 19 


" 


whcnn " 


when 


50 


34 




icere ' ' 


mere 


51 


" 7 


'• 


stench 


stench 


51 


" 40 


'• 


whe're " 


whoWe 


61 


13 


'• 


IlemonsVring '• 


Bemonst'ring 


62 


19 


'• 


Sove 


Love 


62 


" 20 


'• 


Its 


It's 


63 


•' 6 


•' 


art 


ant 


63 


43 


•' 


ungatory " 


nugatory 


66 


12 


'• 


■whose " 


who's 


66 


14 


" 


Our 


One 


69 


44 




his his ' ' 


his 


72 


50 


" 


then 


thou 


73 


=• 32 


•' 


few St 


felVst 


77 


42 


" 


more ' ' 


mere 


79 


" 39 


Place 


quotation points at 


line's end 


80 


" 5 


For 


is Read 


its 


86 


'• 45 


'• 


vigor 


rigor 


90 


23 


" 


hoto " 


her 


94 


" 2 


"" 


descend " 


descent 


102 


49 


" 


hervic " 


heroic 


105 


19 


" 


80 the " 


to 


114 


" 40 


" 


trrnsformation " 


fransformati'n 


118 


" 2 


" 


everpay '• 


overpay 


120 


3 




Put 


Out 


121 


25 


<' 


land " 


laud 


129 


" 31 


" 


rever'ert " 


revcr'st 


129 


42 


" 


Where 


were 


136 


" 29 


•' 


vaunted " 


vaunted 


143 


34 


Inst 


rt thee between into and ground 


146 


33 


For 


stcmes Read 


stems 


151 


10 


•' 


Sphres 


spheres 


156 


18 


" 


has " 


had 


163 


" 9 


" 


loosend 


loosened 


164 


12 


" 


trumbling " 


tumbling 



5^- 


• < 


: ^< c 


< 


c 


'(. c ■ 




C'. 


( C €. 


c 


c 


c c: c 


C 


c 


c C< 




c 


■ c <; ,- 


^ 


c 


' c 


^ 


c 

c 


< < 


^ 


C ( 

C'C 




P 




C<^ 4 



C 


O ■ ^ 


C 


:.•■ * 


c_ A 


c 


c ^ ^ 


< 




^ - i 


cr 


^ <^* 


< 




cr 


c 


^ ^fc 


c 




C '" ^ 


c 


d ^ ^i 


< 






c 


^^< ^ ^ 


<: 


\c 


- ^f- 




c C <X1 


C 


C 






■ ^ a ^Sd 


^ 


c 






C C: » <3C 


C 


c 






■ ' c OC 


c 


c 






t' <■• «' 


C: 


c 


c<^ 




•c « 




r t 






C CC 


r 


< 






r <x 


( 


C 








( 


<• 




^ 


*^ or 




c c 




^ 


CC 


c 


c 




^^ 


<c 


t 


c 




^~ 


' i^'^<. ct 


c 


r 




1 


C^CC <X 

cr CCC CC 
^c CCC .C< 


( 1 

( 

c 
( 


; < 
< 




^^^ 


<c' <:«C«t.^ 


^< 


< 


"^ «CI 


^i 


^' «t '<<:«. 


<( 


(' 


r OCT 


"^" 


<C CCC CC 


c 


iSC? 


^' 


l^^J^ ^ 




C '. 





^<3CXX CC ( c X 

^<- c«:_c q:<<?<c 



ccc 



' c 

^ c 






■-. ( CC 


^^ V( 


!^cr ^ ^ ' 


^. ^-'C 


<: c;< 


5l'^ 


(fsa !'. f 1 


^C/ c 


C CC i 


f 


<GCZ - ^ • 


^L, ^ C 


c c c < 


t_ '^^ 


^Qd ^'^- '- 


^C ■'■'' -*-C 


' ( C 4 


t" '^*^ 


^SC '^'■C/ 


'^Z'C-C- 


L < CC 4 


c^ << ' 


^C '^'c ^ 


' ■^l^*..'*^- 


IL ccc 


^!l ft 


'^3K[L_ '■'■-' 


. ^2_5 -'C 


O 1 t< ( 


^'' < 


^^ ('' 


^Sc c< 




?"" * '^ 


^C ' < i- 


^ <r< cc 


<■ ' (.i; ^ 


^^ ' (rf^" 


' ^Isl '^C/ 


c:«:«: 


C_ ^ CC 


t ^ 


« < 




C ' '. < 


"" u< 


^^ c 


: ^d < 


c < ^^ < 


'C 


^t ^^ 


!tSS 


C t c 


cr 


^K^ <5i 


C^«c CC 


c ^ c 


<< 


^^w c 


€r'«:_ CC 


C c . X 


r "< 


^r c 




C. C vv < 

. C (^H- C 

. C cf" 'C 

t CC* c 

V. C (CC C 


C. _ '-< 


^ ^^ 


■^.^b^"^ 


^' ^f 


* ^i 


^^S 


/ rf' 


^T '{ 


crc:" c 


1 ». 

(C 

^<c 


■ v< 




t ci c: 


<c 


5? 


'^ S-- 5 



